Being  an  dnatasis  of 
the  Money  Issue;  con- 
taining Vital  facts  on 
Tree  Coinage  with  Un- 
answerable Questions 
affecting  this  Campaign, 


PITTS  BviRC 


we  Disp/mn 

\I5LlsniNC 


FRED  LOCKLEY 


4227  8.  C.  Stark  St 

PORTLAND  OM 


A  SlLVeRSYMPOSItM: 


Being  an  /tnafasis  of 
the  Money  Issue;  con 
taming  Vital  Facts  on 
Free  Coinage  with  Un- 
answerable Questions 
affecting  this  Campaign 

by  J/1M6S  F-I1UDSOIV 


IN 


>pyri§htedJ896,by 

rne  Disp/ixcn 


OP  PITTS  E>vjFVG'P/i 


CONTENTS. 


I         THE  BUSINESS  VIEW. — INTRODUCTORY 3 

II         "THK  CRIME  OF  1873" 7 

III  HISTORY  OF  A  FIAT  CRIME 10 

IV  A  CRIME  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 15 

V         BIMETALLISM  OR  MONOMETALLISM 18 

VI        SHIFTING  THEIR  GROUND -.    21 

VII        GOLD  AND  PRICES 26 

VIII        WEALTH  AND  DEBT 33 

IX  GOOD  TIMES  AND  FALLING  PRICES 36 

X        INVENTIONS  AND  ARGUMENTS 40 

X  [        FREE  COINAGE  DELUSIONS 45 

XII         WAGES  AND  PMtriiyG fc-  ;  .;..*.  ••.  .$. 51 

XIII  STANDARD  ANP  JNTEJ^ST  /rfv  ; 53 

XIV  A  CONSIDERATION'dF  ~]U&TIC&!  •  *.*  .•.*.*.  .  .«•* ....     55 

XV         SOPHISTRIES  AND  PREJUDICES   59 

XVI        PRICES  AND  LENDERS 66 

XVII        THE  GREAT  BORROWERS.  . .'. 70 

XVIII        CREDITORS  AND  DEBTORS 73 

XIX        THE  COST  OF  THE  CHANGE ,.75 

XX         STANDARDS  AND  SAVINGS '. 79 

XXL        REVIEWING  THE  FACTS   82 

XXII        THE  DEMANDS  OF  INTEGRITY.  . .  87 


INTRODUCTORY. 


I— The  Business  View. 

Recognizing  that  the  money  ques- 
tion has  been  forced  by  events  into 
a  prominence  which  makes  it  one  of 
the  two  leading  political  issues  of  the 
day,  and  having  clearly  and  forcibly 
expressed  its  own  views  upon  what  it 
esteems  the  folly  and  utter  impractic- 
ability of  free  coinage  of  silver,  The 
Dispatch  does  not  hesitate  to  give  full 
publicity  to  anything  that  can  be  said 
upon  the  other  side.  For  this  reason 
it  cheerfully  prints  the  letter  of  J.  W. 
B —  — ,  which  appears  this  morning 
in  another  column,  as  that  letter  ex- 
hibits about  as  well  as  any  other  the 
line  of  thought  upon  which  the  silver 
people  have  been  making  their  appeal 
to  the  public.  Boiled  down  to  briefest 
space,  it  is  merely  that'  President 
Cleveland,  when  he  took  his  stand  three 
years  ago  against  the  continued  pur- 
chase of  silver,  promised  good  times 
if  the  purchase  act  were  repealed,  and 
good  times  are  not  here;  that  the  peo- 
ple who  have  suffered  from  bad  times 
are  disgusted  with  the  failure  of  the 
President's  predictions  of  prospeiity 
and  "would  sweep  the  field  for  the  sil- 
ver party  as  completely  as  did  the  cy- 
clone St.  Louis  the  other  day"  if  a  ple- 
biscite were  ordered;  that  the  party 
leaders,  both  Democratic  and  Republi- 
can, have  been  insincere  as  the  Ro- 
man augurs  of  old,  and  inconsistent  in 
their  handling  of  the  money  question; 
that  the  business  interests  are  now 
"sneering"  at  the  silverites  in  place  of 
arguing  with  them  seriously;  that  there 
should  be  a  "tariff  to  protect  silver  as 
well  as  to  protect  iron;"  that  no  coun-- 
try  has  a  single  gold  standard;  that 
France,  with  a  population  of  about  half 
of  ours,  maintains  a  large  amount  of 
silver  on  a  parity  with  gold;  that  at 
times  in  the  recent  past  silver  has  ap- 
preciated to  a  higher  value  than  the 
gold  ratio  existing  in  our  coinage  sys- 
tem; and,  finally,  that  the  press  is  one- 
sided in  its  view  of  this  question. 


Now,  as  to  the  first  three  points  in 

Mr.  B 's  article,  which  may  be 

treated  together.  The  Dispatch  has  no 
more  veneration  for  party  leaders  than 
its  correspondent.  It  has  no  very  high 
esteem  either  for  the  intelligence  or 
sincerity  displayed  by  them  upon  the 
money  question.  It  believes,  however, 
that  Cleveland  was  entirely  right  in 
calling  for  a  stoppage  of  silver  pur- 
chases three  years  ago  when  hundreds 
of  millions  of  dollars  worth  of  white 
metal  were  being  stacked  up  in  the 
Treasury  without  a  shadow  of  a  pros- 
pect of  going  into  circulation.  Had  the 
purchasing  process  been  continued,  the 
Government  would  have  gone  on  in- 
definitely adding  to  its  immovable 
metal  and  to  its  paper  obligations  in 
the  shape  of  silver  certificates  issued 
for  the  same. 

All  that  can  be  made  out  of  free  coin- 
age is  either  depreciation  of  our  own 
currency  or  the  inevitable  inflow  into 
this  country  of  the  depreciated  silver 
of  the  world,  unless,  indeed,  as  Mr. 
B —  —  suggests,  a  tariff  be  established 
against  foreign  silver.  But  that  propo- 
sition of  a  tariff  on  silver  betrays  the 
utter  weakness  of  silver,  under  present 
conditions,  as  money.  What  would  be 
thought  of  a  proposition  for  a  tariff  to 
shut  out  gold?  No  one  has  ever  heard, 
until  the  silver  agitation  was  reduced 
to  such  an  extremity,  of  a  tariff  being 
set  up  by  any  country  to  prevent  money 
from  going  into  that  country.  By  sug- 
gesting a  tariff  for  silver  and  recogniz- 
ing that  without  a  tariff  silver  could 
not  be  used  for  free  coinage,  because 
of  the  inundation  of  cheap  silver  from 
all  parts  of  the  earth,  our  clever  cor- 
respondent practically  places  the  white 
metal  upon  the  same  plane  as  pig  iron, 
paper,  coal,  or  any  other  product  of  our 
mills  or  mines.  And  it  is  upon  such  a 
plane  that  it  has  actually  been  placed 
by  the  events  of  the  past  fifteen  years. 

Of  course,  as  Mr.  B claims,  silver 

had  been  recognized  as  of  equal  avail- 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


abHfty,  with;  goid'.for  coinage  purposes 
up  to  a  certain  "time/  Varying  quan- 
tities of  production,  wide  fluctuations  in 
the  market  price,  and,  finally,  the  re- 
strictions placed  upon  the  coinage  of 
silver  by  other  countries,  changed  the 
situation  so  that  it  has  become  impos- 
sible for  the  United  States  to  maintain 
silver  at  a  parity  with  gold  under  such 
conditions  as  free  coinage  calls  for. 
The  silver  dollar  which  can  be  bought 
for,  let  us  say,  50,  60  or  70  cents  of  gold, 
as  the  case  may  be,  in  India,  in  Mexi- 
co, or  Cuba,  cannot  come  into  the 
United  States  and  here  purchase  a  hun- 
dred cents  of  gold,  or  purchase  the 
measure  of  weight  of  any  commodity 
which  a  hundred  cents  of  gold  will 
buy  That  is  the  hard  business  fact 
of  the  case,  which  there  is  no  getting 
over,  unless,  indeed,  by  a  tariff  against 

foreign  silver,  as  Mr.  B suggests. 

But  the  only  plea  upon  which  any  art- 
icle can  claim  to  be  used  in  preference 
to  any  other  article  as  money,  is  that  it 
circulates  universally.  If  it  is  the  fiat 
of  the  Government  which  must  make 
an  article  money,  be  that  fiat  in  the 
shape  of  a  tariff  or  of  a  stamp,  then 
one  commodity  has  as  much  right  as 
another  in  the  matter,  and  the  cheapest 
of  all  would  be  paper. 

We  see  an  historical  fact  in  the  con- 
stitutional reference  to  silver  as  money, 

and  also  in  Mr.  B 's  reference  to 

its  use  as  such  heretofore.  But  the 
conditions  of  its  use,  including  the  ratio 
to  gold,  are  clearly  left  by  common 
sense  to  be  established  according  to 
changing  circumstances;  and  maintain- 
ing free  silver  coinage  at  a  ratio  of 
16  to  1,  is,  as  shown,  not  only  absurd, 
but  impossible.  As  for  the  point  that 
France,  with  a  population  of  half  ours, 
maintains  $500,000,000  worth  of  silver 
on  a  parity  with  gold,  we  see  nothing 
extraordinary  in  that.  The  United 
States  now  maintains  $600,000,000  of 
silver  on  a  parity  with  gold,  by  prac- 
tically the  same  means,  France  having 
suspended  coinage  in  1878  and  the  Uni- 
ted States  in  1890  and  1893.  It  is  not 
to  the  maintenance  of  a  given  or  lim- 
ited amount  of  silver,  however  large, 


at  a  parity  with  gold,  that  the  business 
interests  of  the  country  object,  but  to 
the  indefinite  and  sweeping  proposition 
of  further  and  unlimited  coinage. 

We  have  already  gone  over  the  ques- 
tion of  derangement  of  values  and  up- 
setting of  commercial  and  industrial 
undertakings  which  would  at  once  fol- 
low even  the  bare  prospect  of  free  coin- 
age of  silver.  If  anyone  has  yet  demon- 
strated any  benefit  which  will  accrue 
to  any  interest  in  the  country  from  free 
coinage  of  silver,  excepting  to  the  mine 
owners  and  speculators,  we  have  not 
yet  seen  the  demonstration.  When  it 
comes  to  hand,  The  Dispatch  will  most 
cheerfully  present  and  acknowledge  its 
merits. 


In  the  foregoing  article  The  Dispatch 
on  May  31,  1896,  opened  its  columns  to 
the  discussion,  by  advocates  of  either 
side,  of  the  free  silver  proposition.  The 
only  limit  to  the  discussion  was  the 
terms  of  the  issue  as  placed  before  the 
nation,  namely,  the  free  coinage  of  sil- 
ver, by  the  United  States,  independent- 
ly of  the  action  of  other  nations,  at  the 
specified  ratio  of  16  to  1.  For  over 
six  weeks  after  that  date  a  considerable 
share  of  its  space  was  devoted  to  com- 
munications for  and  against  that  meas- 
ure. The  purpose  of  The  Dispatch  in 
conducting  the  discussion  was  to  ex- 
amine editorially  each  proposition  ad- 
vanced by  the  advocates  of  free  silver, 
to  inquire  into  the  statistical  or  his- 
torical accuracy  of  their  assertions  of 
fact,  to  discuss  the  justice  of  their  con- 
clusions and  thus  to  reach  clear 
grounds  for  an  accurate  and  intelligent 
determination  of  the  whole  issue. 

It  will  be  perceived  that  this  afforded 
the  opportunity  for  a  real  and  thorough 
discussion  of  the  issue  very  different 
from  the  fictitious  debates,  written  b: 
advocates  of  one  or  the  other  side,  who 
invariably  represent  their  opponents  as 
unable  to  answer  the  arguments  ad- 
vanced on  the  side  favored  by  the  writ- 
er. In  the  controversy  of  six  weeks' 
duration,  every  disputant  had  ample 
opportunity  to  examine  or  challenge 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


the  accuracy  of  each  other's  statements. 
It  will  be  seen  by  the  chapters  follow- 
ing, that  The  Dispatch  very  frequently 
challenged  the  statements  of  the  free 
silver  advocates.  Indeed,  it  began  with 
a  complete  contradiction  of  the  histori- 
cal assertion  on  which  the  free  silver 
movement  bases  its  argument.  The  ad- 
vocates of  the  other  side  did  not,  in 
any  case,  undertake  to  overthrow  the 
citations  of  The  Dispatch  from,  statis- 
tics or  history,  although  they  strongly 
disputed  the  conclusions  from  them. 

The  result  of  this  discussion  has  been 
regarded  as  important  enough  to  Justify 
the  request  of  many  readers  that  it  be 
put  in  pamphlet  form.  To  include  in 
the  pamphlet  the  communications  that 
were  published  would  make  a  very 
large  and  expensive  volume,  including 
much  repetition  of  arguments  on  both 
sides.  As  the  editorial  discussion  of 
the  question  included  a  statement  of 
each  argument  brought  up  by  the  free 
silver  advocates — the  fairness  of  which 
statements  none  have  criticized — it  is 
thought  that  this  is  sufficient  to  show 
the  arguments  on  that  side.  The  order 
of  the  discussion,  as  it  appeared  in  the 
daily  issues  of  the  paper,  was  fixed  by 
tho  free  silver  advocates,  The  Dispatch 
being  willing  to  examine  their  propo- 
sitions as  presented,  until  this  process 
afforded  the  ground  for  proceeding  log- 
ically to  the  final  conclusions.  In  the 
pamphlet  the  order  is  changed  by  tak- 
ing up  the  historical  issue  first,  and 
then  proceeding  to  consider  the  various 
branches  of  the  subject  in  their  natural 
order.  In  most  respects,  except  for  the 
striking  out  of  repetitions  of  the  same 
argument,  the  articles  are  given  as  they 
appeared  in  The  Dispatch.  In  a  few 
cases  the  statistics  are  corrected,  by 
giving  later  figures  than  those  attain- 
able when  the  articles  were  published, 
the  United  States  Statistical  Abstract 
for  1896,  and  the  volume  of  the  United 
States  Census  on  Mortgages,  having 
been  received  after  the  discussion  was 
half  through  its  course.  But  in  no  case 
does  this  correction  involve  any  change 
in  the  conclusion  to  be  drawn  from  the 
figures. 


It  Is  proper  in  introducing  the  pamph- 
let to  give  a  few  definitions  or  state- 
ments of  the  terms  used  and  the  undis- 
puted points  of  fact  on  which  the  con- 
troversy rests.  The  need  for  this  ap- 
pears in  the  fact  that  many  people  are 
interested  in  the  political  issue,  to 
whom  the  meaning  of  the  terms  is 
wholly  unknown.  Since  the  discussion 
was  closed,  The  Dispatch  received  a  let- 
ter inquiring  what  was  meant  by  "the 
crime  of  1873."  The  articles  of  The  Dis- 
patch, reproduced  in  the  opening  chap- 
ters of  this  pamphlet,  had  fully  given 
this,  which  of  course  the  inquirer  had 
not  read.  To  enable  those  to  whom  the 
subject  is  wholly  new  to  read  the  suc- 
ceeding discussion  intelligently,  the 
primary  features  of  the  subject  are 
defined,  as  follows: 

Free  coinage  is  the  establishment  of 
the  legal  right  of  any  one  owning  th« 
bullion,  from  which  money  is  made,  to 
deposit  it  at  the  mints  and  to  receive  in 
exchange  for  it  the  coins  which  it  will 
make.  The  freedom  consists  in  the 
right  of  every  one  to  have  his  bullion 
coined,  as  fast  as  the  mints  can  do  th« 
work,  without  limit  in  amount.  It  is 
not  vital  whether  there  is  a  slight  selgn- 
orage,  or  mint  charge,  or  absolutely 
none  at  all,  as  in  England.  All  the 
chief  nations  of  the  world  give  free 
coinage  to  gold.  Many  have  in  the  past 
done  the  same  by  silver,  but  that  priv- 
ilege is  now  afforded  to  silver  in  very 
few  of  them. 

Ratio  is  the  proportion  of  weight  of 
one  monetary  metal,  deemed  to  be  the 
equal  in  value  of  a  different  weight  of 
the  other.  The  commercial  or  market 
ratio  is  that  established  by  the  market 
price  of  the  bullion.  If  we  say  that  sil- 
ver and  gold  are  at  a  commercial  ratio 
of  30  to  1,  it  means  that  in  the  markets 
of  the  world,  an  ounce  of  gold  will  sell 
for  just  as  much  as  30  ounces  of  silver. 
Mint  or  coinage  ratios  are  the  ratios  at 
which  the  mint  of  any  given  nation 
ranks  the  two  metals.  Thus  the  mints 
of  France  establish  a  ratio  of  15  1-2  to  1, 
which  means  that  there  is  15  1-2  times 
as  much  weight  of  silver  In  the  five- 
franc  piece,  as  the  weight  of  gold  re- 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


quired  to  make  the  corresponding  coin. 

Sixteen  to  one  is  the  approximate  ex- 
pression of  the  coinage  ratio  maintain- 
ed nominally  by  the  laws  of  the  United 
States  since  the  coinage  act  of  1834, 
with  one  or  two  exceptions  that  will 
appear  in  the  discussion.  Prior  to  that 
act  the  ratio  had  been  15  to  1.  By  the 
act  of  1834,  the  ratio  was  made  precise- 
ly 16.002  to  1;  and  in  1837  it  was  changed 
to  15.988  to  1.  That  is,  a  silver  dollar 
contains  371  1-4  grains  of  pure  silver, 
or  412  1-2  grains,  900-lOOOths  fine.  The 
gold  dollar  (when  it  was  coined)  and  the 
$5,  $10  and  $20  gold  pieces,  contain,  per 
dollar,  23.22  grains  of  pure  gold,  or  25.8 
of  the  standard  fineness.  This  makes 
the  weight  of  the  silver  dollar  15.988 
times  that  of  the  gold  dollar,  which  is 
generally  referred  to  as  the  ratio  of 
16  to  1. 

Parity  is  the  equality  in  value  of  the 
coins  of  one  metal  with  the  same  or  cor- 
responding coins  of  another  metal.  If 
one  thousand  silver  dollars  circulate 
freely  at  the  same  value  as  $1,000  in 
gold,  parity  exists.  If  either  should  be 
at  a  premium  they  would  not  be  at  a 
parity.  The  parity  must  depend,  there- 
fore, either  on  the  mint  ratio  being  the 
same  as  the  market  ratio,  in  which  case 
the  intrinsic  value  of  the  coins  will  be 
the  same,  or  on  artificial  and  Govern- 
mental maintenance,  by  limiting  the 
coinage  of  the  cheaper  metal  and  pro- 
viding for  the  exchange  of  its  coins 
with  those  of  the  superior  metal. 

Legal  tender  is  the  quality  given  by 
law  that  stated  coins,  or  circulating 
notes,  can  be  offered  in  the  payment  of 
debts  or  discharge  of  contracts  calling 
for  the  payment  of  money.  If  the  con- 
tract should  specify  that  the  payment 
shall  be  made  in  any  special  metal  or 
substance  the  constitutional  provision 
for  the  inviolability  of  contracts  would 
prevent  the  legal  tender  provisions  from 
empowering  the  payment  in  another 
kind  of  money.  But  on  the  great  mass 
of  debts  and  business  transactions  call- 
ing for  the  payment  of  so  many  dollars, 
the  legal  tender  acts  specify  various 
kinds  of  money  the  payment  of  which 
constitutes  a  discharge  of  the  debt. 


Fractional  silver  coins — half-dollars, 
quarters  and  dimes — are  legal  tender 
only  for  amounts  not  exceeding  $10. 
Gold  coins  are  unlimited  legal  tenders, 
and  the  standard  silver  dollars  are  also. 
The  Treasury  notes,  known  as  green- 
backs, and  those  issued  under  the  act 
of  1890,  are  also  full  legal  tender,  ex- 
cept in  payment  of  customs  dues  to  the 
Government.  National  bank  notes  and 
gold  and  silver  certificates  are  not  legal 
tenders,  nor  are  bank  checks  or  drafts. 
But  the  great  majority  of  business  pay- 
ments are  made  in  .the  latter  instru- 
ments of  exchange,  which  are  taken 
just  as  freely  as  legal  tender  money,  so 
long  as  adequate  provision  is  made  for 
their  redemption. 

Bimetallism  is  the  full  and  concurrent 
use  of  both  gold  and  silver  as  money. 
There  is  some  confusion  of  terms  as 
to  what  constitutes  it,  but  the  strictest 
claim  is  that  both  metals  must  have 
free  coinage  and  full  legal  tender.  The 
United  States  has  at  one  time  since  1873 
given  the  silver  dollar  free  coinage  with 
limited  legal  tender,  and  at  another  full 
legal  tender  and  limited  coinage;  but 
neither  is  accepted  by  the  silver  theory 
as  bimetallism.  On  the  other  hand,  it 
is  claimed  by  some  that  the  concurrent 
use,  in  large  amounts,  of  both  metals, 
as  money,  constitutes  bimetallism.  Both 
Prance  and  the  United  States  have  in 
use  hundreds  of  millions  of  silver,  side 
by  side  with  gold;  but  as  it  is  sustained 
by  limiting  the  coinage  it  is  held  to  fall 
short  of  complete  bimetallism,  because 
the  silver  money  is  sustained  on  the 
gold  basis.  This  is,  we  think,  correct. 
But  bimetallism  should  imply  that  both 
metals  are  actually  used  together.  Mex- 
ico is  theoretically  bimetallic,  as  its 
laws  provide  for  the  coinage  of  both 
gold  and  silver  at  a  ratio  of  16  1-2  to  1, 
but  gold  is  at  a  high  premium  and  there- 
fore it  is  practically  a  silver  nation.  It 
will  thus  be  seen  that  real  bimetallism 
nowhere  exists  to-day,  the  nearest  ap- 
proach to  it  being  in  France  and  the 
United  States,  as  already  specified.  In 
its  fullest  sense  it  can  exist  only  where 
the  market  and  mint  ratios  are  the 
same. 


A  SILVER^SYMPOSIUM. 


Monometallism  is  subject  to  the  same 
differences  in  definition  as  bimetallism. 
Strictly,  in  one  sense,  it  is  the  selection 
by  law  of  one  metal  for  the  sole  stan- 
dard money.  Generally,  in  another 
sense,  it  is  the  use  of  a  single  standard 
or  basis  by  nations  which  do  not  main- 
tain true  bimetallism.  In  that  sense, 
all  nations  are  at  present  either  silver 
monometallist  or  gold  monometallist, 
with  the  exception  of  those  wnich  have 
suspended  specie  payments  altogether. 

Demonetization  is  the  taking  away 
of  the  monetary  quality  of  a  metal  pre- 
viously having  full  monetary  standing. 
The  free  silver  school  use  it  most  fre- 
quently in  the  sense  that  either  limit- 
ing the  legal  tender  power  or  restrict- 
ing the  coinage  of  a  metal  demonetizes 
it.  But  it  is  to  be  noted  that  this  does 
not  necessarily  take  away  its  monetary 
use.  In  1853  the  United  States  lim- 
ited the  legal  tender  power  and  took 
away  free  coinage  from  fractional  sil- 
ver coins,  and  yet,  as  was  intended, 
the  United  States  coined  and  used  more 
fractional  silver  after  that  act  than  be- 
fore. On  the  other  hand,  a  monetary 
metal  may  be  demonetized  in  fact,  with- 
out legislation,  by  rising  to  a  value 
greater  than  the  monetary  standard,  or 
by  the  monetary  standard  being  re- 
duced below  its  bullion  value.  When 
this  government  suspended  specie  pay- 
ments, and  its  notes  became  depreciat- 
ed, gold  was  demonetized  by  going  to 
a  premium,  so  far  as  the  United  States 
were  concerned.  Silver  has  in  like  man- 
ner been  demonetized  in  past  years. 

The  claim  of  the  advocates  of  free 
silver  coinage  is  that  the  United  States 
demonetized  silver  in  1873,  following 
in  that  respect  the  example  of  certain 
European  nations;  that  by  so  doing  it 
has  brought  disaster  and  depression  on 
the  country;  hampered  production  and 
oppressed  debtors.  For  the  rectifica- 
tion of  these  asserted  evils,  they  de- 
mand that  the  United  States  shall,  at 
the  earliest  possible  day,  open  the  mints 
to  the  free  coinage  of  silver  dollars, 
which  already  have  full  legal  tender 
quality.  The  opponents  of  this  policy 
are  divided  into  two  classes.  One  of 


them  is  composed  of  the  gold  monomet- 
allists,  who  hold  that  the  single  gold 
standard  is  adequate  and  most  stable. 
The  other  and  larger  class  are  those 
who  believe  in  bimetallism,  who  claim 
that  free  coinage  of  silver  by  the  United 
States  would  establish  silver  monomet- 
allism; that  between  the  single  gold 
basis  and  the  single  silver  basis,  the 
present  one  is  preferable;  that  bimet- 
allism is  only  attainable  on  a  secure 
basis  by  international  action;  and  that 
until  that  can  be  secured,  the  present 
conditions,  with  as  large  a  use  of  silver 
as  is  consistent  with  the  maintenance 
of  the  present  basis,  is  preferable  to  the 
change  that  would  be  brought  by  free 
coinage. 

The  respective  merits  of  these  oppos- 
ing positions,  their  foundation  in  fa^t 
and  reason,  and  the  results  to  be  ex- 
pected from  either,  form  the  subject  of 
the  following  discussion.  It  is  to  be 
seen  that  th,e  two  sides  agree  in  the 
necessity  of  having  the  fundamental 
money  coined  of  either  gold  fp*  silver. 
The  theories  of  fiat  money,  or  the  value 
and  availability  of  various  kinds  of  pa- 
per circulation,  do  not  enter  into  the 
question,  although  a  good  many  of  the 
former  fiat  money  men  support  free 
silver,  and  the  issues  as  to  cheaper 
money,  become  leading  features  of  the 
discussion. 

*    *    * 

II.— "The  Crime    of   1873." 

We  first  propose  to  take  up  the  oft-re- 
ferred to  "crime  of  1873."  The  stock 
assertion  of  the  free  silver  advocates, 
is  that  the  act  of  1873  wiped  out  of  ex- 
istence half  the  coinage  of  the  country. 
Prior  to  1873  it  is  declared  "gold  and 
silver  walked  hand  in  hand  into  the 
mints;"  but  that  act  "struck  down  sil- 
ver," or  "discriminated  against  it,"  and 
legislation  has  continued  to  discrim- 
inate against  silver  ever  since.  It  is 
the  general  allegation  that  this  was  the 
product  of  a  conspiracy  against  silver; 
that  bankers,  capitalists,  money  lend- 
ers and  creditors  all  over  the  world 
purchased  legislation  for  the  express 
purpose  of  diminishing  the  stock  of 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


monetary  metals,  cornering  the  supply; 
oppressing  trade  and  industry,  and 
making  the  unfortunate  debtor  pay 
twice  what  he  received.  It  is  also  an 
essential  part  of  the  charge  that  the 
action  of  the  United  States  Congress 
was  purchased  by  this  conspiracy  and 
that  the  sections  of  that  act  which  ef- 
feeted  the  demonetization  of  silver  were 
attached  to  it  without  the  knowledge  of 
the  majority  of  the  members  of  Con- 
gress. 

If  these  assertions  were  true,  it  would 
be  correct  to  call  it  a  crime.  But  they 
are  not  true.  In  dealing  with  other 
questions  of  fact  we  may  recognize  that 
for  many  of  them  there  was  a  color  of 
foundation  which  enabled  those  who 
nmde  them  without  exhaustive  study 
of  the  statistics  to  be  treated  as  mak- 
ing them  in  good  faith.  But  this  in- 
dictment of  the  honesty,  good  faitii  and 
intelligence  of  the  statesmen  of  24  years 
ago  is  in  its  creation  a  downright  false- 
hood andjin  its  repetition  a  persistent 
slander.  It  may  be  uttered  in  ignorance 
by  some  who  do  so  without  examining 
toe  facts  accessible  to  any  student;  but 
we  propose  to  show  that  at  least  one 
man,  holding  high  official  position,  and 
a  recognized  leader  of  the  free  silver 
men,  persists  in  circulating  that  sland- 
er with  full  and  personal  knowledge  of 
its  utter  falsity. 

There  are  three  branches  of  the  sub- 
ject raised  by  this  allegation:  First, 
the  statistics  of  coinage  in  the  United 
States  as  affected  by  the  act  and  the 
subsequent  legislation  of  this  Govern- 
ment; second,  the  history  of  that  legis- 
lation and  preceding  acts  bearing  on 
the  period  of  alleged  bimetallism;  third, 
the  facts  with  regard  to  the  world- wide 
movement  to  the  gold  basis.  In  each 
of  these  there  is  clear  proof  of  the 
falsity  of  the  allegation  of  a  conspiracy 
of  money  lords  purchasing  the  legis- 
lation of  this  country  and  the  world. 

The  shortest  and  most  direct  proof  of 
the  falsity  of  the  assertion  that  the  act 
of  1873  "struck  down  silver"  is  pre- 
sented by  the  statistics  of  coinage  dur- 
ing the  immediate  operation  of  that  act 
and  for  a  corresponding  period  imme- 


diately preceding  it.  The  act  was  in 
operation  for  five  years  before  it  was 
amended  by  the  Bland  act  of  1878.  The 
statistics  of  the  total  silver  coinage  of 
the  United  States  for  the  five  years  be- 
fore and  after  the  opening  of  1873  are 
as  follows: 

Before.  ;  After. 

1868 $1,074,34311873   ....$  4,024,747 

1869 1,226,1431 1874   ....     6,851,776 

1870 1,378,2551875   ....  15,347,893 

1871 3,104,03811876   ....  24,503,307 

1872 2,504,488  1877  ....  28,393,046 


Total..  $9,287,267 
Annual 
average  ..$1,857,453  average 


Total.  $79,120,769 
Annual 

.  $15,824,153 


The  history  of  the  world's  financial 
legislation  will  be  searched  in  vain  for 
a  parallel  to  this  unique  method  of  dis- 
criminating against  silver  by  coining 
over  eight  and  a  half  times  as  much 
silver  after  passage  of  the  act  as  be- 
fore. But  that  really  does  not  tell  the 
whole  statistical  story.  The  average 
annual  silver  coinage  of  the  United 
States  for  the  whole  80  years  during 
which  our  silver  friends  allege  gold 
and  silver  stood  side  by  side  was  $1,792,- 
000.  So  that  the  first  effect  of  the  "con- 
spiracy against  silver"  was  to  increase 
its  coinage  by  the  United  States  nearly 
nine  times!  These  are  the  statistics 
for  all  kinds  of  silver  coinage  from 
dimes  up  to  dollars.  The  one  respect 
in  which  the  act  of  1873  changed  the 
conditions  of  existing  fact  was  to  sub- 
stitute for  the  disused  standard  dol- 
lars., trade  dollars  of  420  grains,  limited 
as  to  legal  tender,  with  the  purpose  of 
increasing  their  circulation  in  Asia. 
They  did  so  circulate,  $35,965,000  of 
them  being  coined,  of  which  something 
over  $6,000,000  remained  in  or  returned 
to  this  country  and  were  redeemed  by 
the  Treasury.  So  that  by  the  distinctive 
feature  of  this  act  nearly  $30,000,000  of 
American  silver  found  a  market  abroad. 
This  gives  another  unique  view  of  the 
"conspiracy  against  silver." 

That  was  the  operation  of  the  act  of 
1873  for  the  period  in  which  it  was  sole- 
ly in  force.  But  the  assertion  of  the 
silver  men  is  that  its  baneful  effect  is 
still  in  force.  The  discrimination 


8 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


against  silver  which  they  claim  has  de- 
pressed its  price,  still  continues.  If  it 
had  been  corrected  by  the  acts  of  1878 
and  1890,  they  would  have  no  present 
ground  for  complaint.  It  is,  therefore, 
pertinent  to  extend  the  statistics  over 
the  whole  period  before  and  since  1873 
in  order  to  perceive  the  actual  work- 
ings of  the  conspiracy.  They  are  as 
follows: 
Total  silver  coinage,  1792- 

1872  $143,833,000 

Total    silver    coinage    and 

bullion  purchased,  1873-95  705,683,000 
Annual  average  prior  to  1873.  1,792,000 
Annual  average  since  1873...  31,017,000 

In  these  figures  we  have  lumped  the 
total  of  bullion  purchased  under  the  act 
of  1890,  and  remaining  uncoined,  at 
$155,000,000.  The  total  purchased  un- 
der that  act  was  of  the  nominal  coin- 
age value  of  over  $217,000,000,  but  as 
nearly  as  can  be  learned  from  the  re- 
ports, about  $50,000,000  of  it  has  since 
been  coined.  We  thus  find  out  that 
the  discrimination  against  silver  in- 
duced by  the  money  lords  consisted  of 
coining  nearly  five  times  as  much  silver 
in  the  22  years  succeeding  1873  as  in 
the  80  years  preceding  it.  The  an- 
nual mint  demand  of  the  United  States 
for  silver  has  been  sine*  1873  more 
than  17  times  that  prior  to  1873 ;  which 
again  resolves  the  "striking  down"  of 
silver  by  legislation  into  one  of  the 
most  unique  curiosities  of  the  century. 

This  exhibits  the  total  demand  of  the 
United  States  for  silver  during  the  per- 
iods contrasted.  They  afford  the  most 
complete  commentary  not  only  on  the 
claim  that  the  United  States  has  dis- 
criminated against  silver,  but  on  the 
claim  that  the  United  States  can  by  it- 
self restore  the  gold  price  of  silver  to 
$1.29  per  ounce.  But  this  is  not  all. 
The  silver  men's  claim  is  that  it  is  the 
silver  dollar  that  has  been  discrimin- 
ated against.  They  make  no  attack  on 
the  laws  under  which  half-dollars, 
quarters  and  dimes  are  coined,  which 
were  the  same  before  1873  as  after.  But 
their  grievance  is  on  the  silver  dollar. 
That  coin  is  discriminated  against. 
That  coin  was  struck  down  by  the  con- 


spiracy of  1873,  and  when  it  is  restored 
to  its  place  it  will  raise  the  price  of  sil- 
ver to  the  parity  with  gold.     Let  us 
see  what  the  facts  are: 
Fractional  silver  coined  be- 
fore 1873 $185,787,000 

Silver  dollars  coined  before 

1873 8,045,838 

Fractional  silver  coined  since 

1873    121,894,000 

Silver    dollars    and    bullion 

purchased  since  1872 584,289,000 

In  other  words,  the  fact  appears  in 
theso  figures  that  the  much  praised  per- 
iod when  the  silver  dollar  stood  side  by 
side  with  the  gold  dollar,  simmers  down 
into  an  actual  coinage  of  those  beloved 
dollars  of  $8,045,000.  Before  1873  Just 
about  one-eighteenth  of  the  silver  coin- 
age was  in  standard  dollars,  and  seven- 
teen-eighteenths  was  fractional  silver. 
Since  1873  nearly  six-sevenths  of  the 
silver  coinage  was  in  standard  dollars, 
and  only  a  little  over  one-seventh  in 
fractional  silver.  Before  1873  the  an- 
nual average  coinage  of  the  standard 
dollar  was  $100,573;  since  1873  it  has 
been  $25,363,000.  That  is,  the  Govern- 
ment has  coined  250  times  as  many  sli- 
ver dollars  per  year  as  it  did  before  the 
conspiracy  against  silver  struck  It 
down;  and  the  fact  that  this  coinage 
did  not  really  begin  till  1878,  shows 
that  for  16  years  the  United  States  used 
each  year  300  times  the  amount  of  sil- 
ver for  the  purposes  of  standard  legal 
tender  than  the  annual  average  before 
1873. 

These  statistics  may  begin  to  impress 
on  the  mind  of  the  reader  not  only  that 
the  allegation  of  silver  having  been 
struck  down  and  depreciated  by  deny- 
ing it  access  to*  the  mints  is  a  product 
of  cheap  invention,  but  that  the  allega- 
tion of  silver  having  stood  side  by  side 
with  gold  prior  to  that  act  is  no  less  a 
figment  of  the  imagination.  That  there 
may  be  no  doubt  on  that  point  we  add 
the  following  figures: 
Coinage.  Before  1873.  After  1873. 

Gold    $795,091,000  1,017,129,000 

Silver  dollars...      8,045,000      429,289,000 
Bullion  certifi- 
cates        155,000,000 

Frac.  silver....  135,833,00.0      121,394,000 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


Here  -vre  have  the  evidence  that  prior 
to  1873  the  coinage  of  the  country  con- 
sisted of  over  a  hundred  dollars  in 
gold  to  one  of  the  standard  silver  dol- 
lars. In  that  period  of  alleged  bimetal- 
lism, the  money  of  the  country  was,  of 
every  $100  coined,  $84.80  in  gold,  $14.35 
in  fractional  silver,  and  85  cents  in  the 
much  trumpeted  bimetallic  silver  dol- 
lars which  did  not  circulate,  as  we 
shall  show  in  the  next  article.  This  ia 
enough  to  show  that  bimetallism  prior 
to  1873  was  a  legal  fiction  and  as  a  mat- 
ter of  fact  was  non-existent.  On  the 
other  hand,  since  1873,  standard  silver 
dollars  and  bullion  certificates  com- 
prise about  six-seventeenths;  fractional 
silver,  one-seventeenth  and  gold  nine- 
seventeenths,  of  the  entire  coinage. 

It  might  be  expected  of  men  who  un- 
dertook to  argue  the  question  of  coin- 
age that  they  would  take  the  trouble  to 
inform  themselves  of  the  published  sta- 
tistics of  coinage.  In  the  face  of  these 
figures  what  is  to  be  said  of  those  who 
base  their  whole  argument  on  the  per- 
sistent cry  that  the  United  States  form- 
erly kept  silver  side  by  aid*  with  gold, 
and  that  a  condition  of  bimetallism  was 
destroyed  by  the  foul  conspiracy  which 
struck  silver  down,  as  we  have  seen, 
by  using  17  times  aa  much  silver  and 
coining  250  times  as  many  silver  dol- 
lars per  annum  as  before  that  fiat  act  of 
assassination? 


III.-History  of  a  Plat  Crime. 

The  "crime  of  1873"  as  we  showed  in 
our  article  of  last  Friday,  had  the 
unique  effect  of  multiplying  the  coin- 
age of  silver  by  eight  during  the  period 
when  it  was  exclusively  in  operation, 
while  the  policy  which  is  still  the  object 
of  attack  by  the  free  silver  men  is  sta- 
tistically set  forth  in  the  fact  that  an- 
nually the  United  States  has  since  1873 
coined  250  standard  silver  dollars  to 
every  one  prior  to  that  year.  To  this 
fact  the  further  statistical  disclosure 
that  during  the  alleged  period  of  bi- 
metallism the  coinage  of  the  dollar  of 
our  fathers  did  not  equal  one  to  a  hun- 
dred dollars  of  gold  may  have  suggested 


to  our  readers  that  there  was  not  very 
much  silver  for  the  act  of  1873  to  strike 
dcwn.  We  propose  to  show  from  the 
records  that  this  is  the  fact.  We  pro- 
pose to  show  just  how  much  bimetal- 
lism there  ever  was  in  the  country, 
just  when  it  passed  out  of  existence  and 
what  the  record  of  legislative  recogni- 
tion of  that  fact  is. 

In  order  to  do  this  intelligently  we 
give  the  record  of  the  coinage  by  the 
United  States  for  the  different  periods; 
first  from  the  beginning  of  coinage  to 
the  change  under  the  coinage  law  of 
1837;  thence  to  the  change  brought 
about  by  the  Californian  and  Austral- 
ian gold  developments  in  1850;  then  the 
period  from  1850  to  1873,  and  the  total 
for  the  20  years  since  1873.  To  com- 
press into  the  space  occupied  the  fig- 
ures less  than  thousands  are  omitted 
below. 

Frac- 
tional     Silver 

Years.  Gold.     Silver.     Dollars. 

1793-1836  ...$  21,893  $45,415  $  1,440 
1837-1849  ..  68,444  30,548  916 

1850  1873  ...  709,752  59,824  5,689 
1873-1893  ..1,017,129  121,394  429,289 

We  cite  the  Congressional  Globe,  con- 
taining the  declarations  made  on  the 
floor  of  Congress,  to  prove  that  silver 
was  not  demonetized  in  1873,  but  that 
the  only  silver  coinage  that  ever  con- 
stituted an  approximation  to  bimetal- 
lism in  the  United  States  was  demone- 
tized in  1853,  because  it  had  previously 
demonetized  itself,  and  that  the  act 
of  1873  was  simply  the  legislative  rec-' 
ognition  of  the  facts  as  they  had  stood 
for  20  years  before,  on  the  single  point 
left  uncovered  by  the  act  of  1853.  This 
will  show  that  the  assertion  that  silver 
formed  half  of  the  money  of  the  coun- 
try from  1850  to  1873  is  wholly  unsup- 
ported in  point  of  fact. 

To  bring  the  record  up  to  the  act  of 
1853  we  should  notice  that  in  the  ori- 
ginal coinage  laws  silver  was  coined  at 
a  ratio  of  15  to  1.  The  silver  half  dol- 
lars quarters  and  dimes  contained  the 
same  weight  of  silver  as  the  dollar  and 
were  legal  tender.  The  working  of 
this  law  is  shown  in  the  fact  that  over 


10 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


two- thirds  of  the  coinage  up  to  1837 
was  fractional  silver.  Gold  was  coined 
to  the  small  extent  of  about  a  half  mil- 
lion dollars  per  year,  but  immediately 
left  the  country.  The  dollar  of  our  fath- 
ers was  coined  to  an  average  of  about 
$30,000  per  year.  This  may  be  the  ideal 
bimetallism  to  which  our  free  silver 
friends  refer  so  often,  but  it  was  so  lit- 
tle satisfactory  to  those  who  experi- 
enced it  that  they  changed  it  in  the 
law  of  1837  by  advancing  the  ratio  to 
16  to  1.  The  coinage  of  the  following 
13  years  shows  that  the  use  of  gold  was 
largely  increased  by  the  change,  consti- 
tuting over  two-thirds  of  the  entire 
coinage.  Silver  was  also  used  to  a  con- 
siderable extent,  but  almost  entirely,  in 
the  fractional  form,  there  being  $30,000,- 
000  coined  of  the  subsidiary  silver,  but 
only  916,000  of  the  alleged  "dollars  of 
the  Constitution."  But  the  working  of 
that  coinage  law  is  shown  by  the  rea- 
sons which  produced  the  act  of  1853. 

The  facts  with  regard  to  that  bill  are 
amply  set  forth  in  the  Congressional 
Globe  for  the  second  session  of  the 
Thirty-second  Congress,  and  appendix 
thereto.  Mr.  Dunham,  of  Indiana,  the 
Chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Coinage, 
in  opening  the  debate  in  the  House, 
clearly  stated  the  purpose  of  its  provis- 
ions. The  definite  enactments  were 
that  the  weight  of  silver  in  the  half 
dollars,  quarters  and  dimes  should  be 
reduced  to  192  grains  for  the  half  dol- 
lar, and  other  coins  in  proportion,  mak- 
ing the  weight  of  a  dollar's  worth  of 
them  384  grains;  that  they  should  be 
excluded  from  free  coinage,  the  mint 
being  authorized  to  purchase  bullion  to 
coin  them,  and  that  their  legal  tender 
should  be  restricted  to  amounts  of  $5. 

Bearing  in  mind  that  the  silver  coins 
thus  treated  comprised  $.76,000,000  out 
of  the  $78,000,000  of  silver  coined  up  to 
1850,  Mr.  Dunham's  remarks  on  its  ob- 
ject are  significant.  He  said  that  its 
purpose  was  "to  have  the  standard  cur- 
rency consist  of  gold  only,  and  that 
these  silver  coins  shall  be  subservient 
to  it,  and  that  they  shall  be  used  rather 
as  tokens  than  as  standard  currency." 
He  went  on  to  show  at  length  in  his 


speech  (reported  in  full  at  page  190, 
appendix  to  Congressional  Globe,  sec- 
ond session,  Thirty-second  Congress) 
that  the  premium  on  silver  was  taking 
all  the  silver  coin  out  of  the  country. 
"Coin's"  cheap  fiction  about  the  coun- 
try being  supplied  with  Spanish  and 
other  silver  dollars  is  shown  in  its  true 
light  by  Mr.  Dunham's  statement  that 
the  only  silver  above  the  three-cen* 
pieces  which  remained  in  the  country 
was  the  degraded  foreign  coin,  "the  de- 
preciation of  these  foreign  coins  by 
abrasion  being  from  6  to  20  per  cent." 
The  bill  was  evoked,  it  was  explained, 
by  the  necessity  of  preserving  the  stock 
of  fractional  silver,  for  which  purpose 
the  fractional  coins  were  to  be  reduced 
in  weight.  The  dollar  was  to  be  left 
"as  it  is  now,  an  article  of  merchan- 
dise"; but  with  regard  to  the  silver  that 
it  was  necessary  to  keep,  it  was  pro- 
posed to  recognize  the  fact  set  forth  in 
Mr.  Dunham's  words:  "We  hare  had 
but  a  single  standard  for  the  last  three 
or  four  years.  That  has  been  and  is 
gold.  We  propose  to  let  it  remain  so, 
and  to  adapt  silver  to  it  and  regulate  it 
by  it." 

There  was  quite  a  sharp  little  debate 
over  this  bill,  and  proof  that  it  was  not 
passed  without  public  knowledge  is  giv- 
en in  the  form  of  a  memorial  from  the 
New  Jersey  legislature,  setting  forth 
that  silver  coins  "are  no  longer  a  stan- 
dard of  value  in  payment  and  are  only 
used  as  an  article  of  commerce,"  and 
therefore  urging  the  passage  of  the  bill. 
It  is  singular,  too,  that  the  main  opposi- 
tion to  the  bill  was  not  because  it  pro- 
posed to  adopt  the  single  gold  standard, 
but  because  one  of  its  provisions  en- 
dangered the  permanence  of  that  stan- 
dard. Mr.  Skelton,  of  New  Jersey,  led 
the  opposition  to  an  amendment  which 
the  committee  had  reported,  making 
the  fractional  silver  coins  legal  tender 
in  payments  to  the  Government.  He 
said  in  his  remarks:  "Gold  is  the  only 
standard  of  value  by  which  all  prop- 
erty is  now  measured;  it  is  virtually  the 
only  currency  of  the  country."  But  Mr. 
Skelton  was  afraid  that  the  amendment 
just  referred  to  might  make  the  frac- 


11 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


tional  silver  another  and  cheaper  stan- 
dard, and  that  "  it  would  drive  the  gold 
soin  from  circulation  and  substitute 
that  of  silver,  thus  producing  a  greater 
evil  thaa  the  one  proposed  to  be  reme- 
died." Mr.  Skelton  pressed  this  objec- 
tion so  vigorously  that  the  House  voted 
down  the  amendment,  and  passed  the 
bill  as  it  came  from  the  Senate,  thus 
making  clear  the  desire  that  the  gold 
basis  be  undisturbed. 

Here  is  a  clear  recognition  of  the  pur- 
pose and  desire  to  adopt  the  gold  basis. 
The  bill  took  away  free  coinage  and  re- 
stricted the  legal  tender  power  of  all 
the  silver  coins  that  had  been  actually 
in  circulation.  The  avowal  in  the  House 
was  positive  of  the  adoption  of  the  gold 
standard,  and  the  purpose  to  make  sil- 
ver only  subsidiary.  There  was  little 
discussion  in  the  Senate,  the  bill  being 
assented  to  as  coming  from  the  admin- 
istration. It  is  indicative  of  the  value 
«f  recent  citations  of  Daniel  Webster 
as  authority  for  the  belief  that  the  Con- 
stitution requires  the  coinage  of  silver, 
that  this  bill  for  the  demonetization  of 
the  silver  then  coined  was  prepared  and 
sent  to  Congress  by  an  administration 
ia  which  Daniel  Webster  was  the  lead- 
ing Cabinet  officer. 

These  were  the  conditions  of  fact  and 
law  established  when  Congress  came 
to  take  up  the  revision  of  the  mint 
laws  in  1870.  The  silver  dollar  was 
left  nominally  on  the  statute  book,  be- 
cause the  act  of  1853  dealt  only  with 
the  coins  which  it  wished  to  keep  in  the 
country,  and  which  it  kept  by  reducing 
their  weight  and  limiting  them  to  sub- 
sidiary coin.  But  the  facts  recognized 
in  1853  continued.  Demonetization  did 
not  limit  the  use  of  the  fractional  sil- 
ver coins.  On  the  contrary,  their  an- 
nual coinage  was  increased  50  per  cent. 
But  the  coinage  of  gold  swelled  to  such 
an  extent  that  of  774  millions  of  coin- 
age, 709  millions  were  gold,  59  millions 
of  subsidiary  silver  and  five  and  a  half 
millions,  or  less  than  one  dollar  in  a 
hundred,  were  silver  dollars,  and  that 
the  silver  dollars  remained  as  declared 
in  Congress,  an  article  of  merchandise 
te  shown  by  the  fact  that  during  the  10 


years  of  specie  payments,  1853  to  1862, 
the  total  coinage  of  these  dollars  was 
1,723,770. 

In  the  enactments  of  1873,  the  disposi- 
tion of  the  silver  dollar  was  a  very 
slight  part  of  the  whole  bill.  The  act 
dealt  with  topics  which  made  much 
more  debate  in  the  provisions  for  as- 
saying and  coining  gold,  about  which 
the  Pacific  coast  legislators  had  a  great 
deal  to  say.  Consequently,  the  disposi- 
tion of  the  silver  dollar  did  not  make 
very  much  talk,  because,  first,  it  dealt 
with  a  coin  practically  non-existent, 
and,  second,  one  about  which  there  was 
no  real  difference  of  opinion.  But  that 
the  deprivation  of  free  silver  «oinage 
or  the  limitation  of  legal  tender  was 
done  surreptitiously,  is  shown  by  the 
record  to  be  a  malicious  slander. 

In  the  first  place,  the  proposed  revis- 
ion of  the  mint  law  was  sent  out  to  ex- 
perts by  the  director  of  the  mint  before 
Congress  met  for  the  session  of  1869-70. 
In  the  original  draft  and  up  to  a  late  date 
in  the  history  of  the  bill,  it  was  pro- 
posed to  reduce  the  weight  of  the  silver 
dollar  to  384  grains,  and  make  it  a  sub- 
sidiary coin  like  the  halves  and  quar- 
ters. This  was  freely  pointed  out  and 
criticised  by  experts,  but  the  bill  was 
introduced  in  that  shape,  the  purpose 
of  taking  away  free  coinage  and  re- 
stricting its  legal  tender  to  five  dollars 
having  been  publicly  stated  before  Con- 
gress met. 

The  bill  was  submitted  to  Congress, 
April  25,  1870.  It  was  discussed,  re- 
ferred back  and  forth,  and  revived  with 
the  same  operation  to  go  over  during 
three  sessions.  Very  little  of  the  discus- 
sion was  with  regard  to  the  silver  dol- 
lar, because  that  was  taken  as  a  matter 
decided  by  existing  conditions.  But  the 
purpose  of  completing  the  conformity  of 
our  laws  to  the  facts  was  clearly  stated 
in  the  presence  and  with  the  participa- 
tion in  discussion  of  members  who  sub- 
sequently figured  as  free  silver  men. 
The  fact  shown  by  the  Congressional 
Glebe  that  one  William  M.  Stewart, 
United  States  Senator  from  Nevada, 
took  an  active  part  in  the  debate  when 
it  was  in  the  Senate  the  first  time,  made 


12 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


a  vigorous  stand  with  the  other  Pacific 
coast  Senator  to  abolish  the  mint 
charge  on  the  coinage  of  gold,  and  voted 
for  the  bill,  with  whose  provisions  the 
debates  show  that  he  was  familiar,  is 
enough  to  present  one  leading  assail- 
ant of  "the  crime  of  1873"  in  his  true 
light  as  a  fraud  and  fabricator. 

We  propose  to  give  two  quotations 
from  the  record,  showing  that  the  fav- 
orite free  silver  charge  is  an  utter  in- 
vention, and  to  be  satisfied  with  that. 
On  April  9,  1872,  Mr.  Hooper,  of  Massa- 
chusetts, opening  the  debate  in  the 
House,  stated  that  the  legal  theory  es- 
tablished by  the  act  of  1792  was  that 
the  silver  dollar  was  the  legal  unit.  He 
went  on  to  show  that  it  had  since  be- 
come an  article  of  commerce,  and  stat- 
ed the  purpose  of  the  sections  of  the 
bill  bearing  on  this  point  was  "that  25.8 
grains  of  standard  gold,  constituting 
tho  gold  dollar,  should  be  declared  the 
legal  unit  of  account."  Further  on  in 
his  remarks  he  outlined  that  the  pro- 
posed silver  dollar  of  384  grains  was  to 
be  "subsidiary  coin  in  harmony  with 
the  silver  coin  of  less  denomination. 
The  silver  dollar  of  412^5  grains,  by  rea- 
son of  its  bullion  or  intrinsic  value  be- 
ing greater  than  the  nominal  value,  has 
long  since  ceased  to  be  a  coin  of  circu- 
lation." (Congressional  Globe,  Part  3, 
2d  session,  42d  Congress,  pp.  2305  and 
2306.) 

The  main  statement  on  this  point 
was  not  disputed,  although  the  allusion 
to  silver  precipitated  a  very  pretty  fight. 
Mr.  Potter  (Dem.,  New  York),  com- 
mented on  the  fact  that  "this  bill  pro- 
vides for  the  making  of  changes  in  the 
legal  tender  coin  of  the  country,  and 
for  substituting  as  legal  tender  coin 
of  only  one  metal,  instead  of,  as  here- 
tofore, two.  I  think  myself  this  would 
be  a  wise  provision  and  that  legal  ten- 
der coins,  except  subsidiary  coins, 
should  be  of  gold  alone;  but  why  should 
we  legislate  on  this  now,  when  we  are 
not  using  either  of  these  metals  as  a 
circulating  medium?"  (Page  2310.) 

The  partisan  enlargement  of  Mr.  Pot- 
ter on  this  theme  brought  Hon.  W.  D. 
Kelley,  of  Pennsylvania,  to  the  front 


in  a  somewhat  irritated  mood.  He 
pointed  out  (page  2311)  that  "every  coin 
of  ours  that  is  not  gold  is  subsidiary. 
Our  silver  dollar,  half  dollar  and  every 
other*  coin  that  is  not  gold  is  subsidi- 
ary," and  proceeded  to  charge  Mr.  Pot- 
ter with  opposing  this  bill  in  the  inter- 
est of  silver  bullion  brokers  in  New 
York,  who  were  using  the  assay  and 
stamp  of  the  mint  as  an  economical  cer- 
tificate of  the  weight  and  quality  of 
their  bullion  to  be  exported.  But  in  do- 
ing so  Mr.  Kelly  raised  a  hornets'  nest. 
Messrs.  Potter,  Wood  and  other  Demo- 
crats came  back  so  vigorously  with 
charges  that  other  provisions  of  the 
bill  were  going  to  furnish  cheap  assays 
to  gold  miners  in  the  West  that  after 
a  warm  fight  the  bill  went  over.  The 
significance  of  the  debate  for  present 
purposes  is  that  it  opened  with  a  clear 
and  unmistakable  declaration,  and 
without  dissent,  of  the  purpose  of  dis- 
continuing free  coinage  and  unlimited 
legal  tender  of  the  silver  dollar  as  a 
coin,  entirely  discontinued  in  practical 
use. 

The  bill,  having  passed  the  House, 
went  back  to  the  Senate,  and  was  there 
debated  at  length.  Near  the  close  of 
the  debate,  Mr.  Casserly,  of  California, 
declared  "the  half  dollar  and  quarter 
dollar  are  the  money  of  the  people  and 
they  are  the  leading  coins  of  our  entire 
silver  coinage" — for  which  reason  he 
wished  the  figure  of  Liberty  retained 
on  them.  A  little  further  on,  with  re- 
gard to  the  regulation  Pacific  coast  de- 
sire to  get  the  mint  charge,  or  seignor- 
age,  on  gold  coinage  abolished,  he  spoke 
of  the  English  need  of  silver  for  China 
and  India,  and  said:  "We  have  more 
silver  than  we  want.  Nevada  appears 
to  be  getting  ready  to  deluge  the  world 
with  silver.  I  see  that  her  silver  prod- 
uct last  year  was  probably  over  $20,- 
000,000.  Now,  sir,  I  submit  that  there 
could  not  be  a  better  basis  for  ex- 
change, nor  a  more  profitable  opera- 
tion for  the  American  people,  than  to 
take  the  gold  bullion  of  Australia,  and 
coin  it  in  San  Francisco,  and  diffuse 
that  much  more  specie  through  all  the 
arteries  of  business,  «*tting  ready  for 


13 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM 


the  resumption  of  specie  payments,  and 
to  give  them  in  return  this  silver  which 
we  do  not  want."  The  Globe  shows  that 
only  a  few  minutes  before  Mr.  Casser- 
17  had  made  these  remarks,  William  M. 
Stewart  had  participated  in  the  debate, 
making  it  a  fair  inference  that  he  heard 
this  practical  declaration  that  the  sil- 
ver dollar  was  not  the  "money  of  the 
people"  enough  to  be  mentioned  among 
"the  leading  silver  coins,"  and  the  de- 
velopment of  the  theory  that  silver  was  a 
commodity  to  be  sold  abroad  in  ex- 
change for  the  gold  that  was  alone 
wanted  for  specie  payments.  And  not 
only  did  William  M.  Stewart  fail  to  pro- 
tect against  such  ideas,  but  he  actually 
supported  them  by  his  vote! 

While  Mr.  Casserly  did  not  win  his 
point  on  gold  coinage  directly,  his  re- 
marks bore  fruit  in  the  subsequent  con- 
ference on  the  bill.  The  cheap  money 
slander  has  sometimes  taken  the  form 
that  silver  was  demonetized  in  confer- 
ence committee.  The  quotations  already 
made  show  the  disproof  of  the  assertion 
by  the  clear  avowal  of  this  pro- 
vision in  the  early  stages  of  the  bill. 
What  was  done  in  conference  commit- 
tee was  doubtless  suggested  by  Mr. 
Casserly's  remarks  to  frame  a  provision 
for  the  increasing  sale  of  silver  abroad. 
Instead  of  reducing  the  dollar  to  384 
grains,  it  was  increased  to  the  trade 
dollar  of  420  grains.  That  dollar  was 
given  free  coinage,  but  limited  legal 
tender.  It  was  designed  to  sell  Ameri- 
can silver  in  Asia,  and  it  did  so  to  the 
extent  of  nearly  $30,000,000. 

There  is  subsequent  evidence  that 
'Senator  Stewart  understood  exactly 
what  was  done  with  silver,  at  that  time. 
On  February  11, 1874,  in  reply  to  a  reso- 
lution of  inquiry  offered  by  him,  con- 
cerning, the  capacity  of  the  mints,  the 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  defined  the 
coins  under  the  act  as  "subsidiary  sil- 
ver coin  in  addition  to  the  gold,  trade 
dollar  and  minor  coinage,"  and  the  Sen- 
ator from  Nevada  accepted  the  defini- 
tion. But  this  is  not  all.  Senator  Stew- 
art not  only  knew  the  scope  and  effect 
of  the  coinage  act  of  1873,  but  he  heart- 
ily approved  of  it  at  least  as  late  as 


February  11,  1874,  -  when  he  declared 
himself  in  favor  of  the  gold  standard, 
lie  did  so  in  a  speech  on  a  bill  to  amend 
the  national  banking  law.  In  the  course 
of  that  speech  he  said: 

"Let  us  do  as  all  the  people  of  the 
world  have  been  doing  from  the  begin- 
ning, measure  our  values  in  gold.' 

"What  does  the  Senator  want?"  asked 
Senator  Logan. 

"I  want  the  standard  gold,  and  no  pa- 
per money  not  redeemable  in  gold," 
was  the  reply  in  part. 

Again,  in  a  speech  on  the  same  sub- 
ject in  the  Senate,  on  February  20,  1874, 
Senator  Stewart  declared:  "Gold  is  the 
universal  standard  of  the  world.  Every- 
body knows  what  a  dollar  in  gold  is 
worth." 

These  indisputable  facts  from  the  of- 
ficial record  enable  us  to  see  how  much 
truth  there  is  in  the  basic  allegation 
of  the  free  silver  doctrine.  The  facts  are: 

Tlie  act  of  1873  did  not  strike  down 
silver,  it  increased  the  coinage  of  it. 

It  did  not  demonetize  any  coin  in 
use  as  money,  at  that  time  or  for  23 
years  previous. 

The  demonetization  of  the  coin 
which  constituted  94  per  cent  of  all 
the  silver  coined  prior  to  1873,  took 
place  in  1853,  and  it  was  done  to 
keep  fractional  silver  in  the  country. 

The  discrimination  against  silver 
since  1873  has  consisted  in  coining 
seventeen  times  as  mnch  silver,  per 
year,  and  25O  times  as  many  silver 
dollars,  as  before  1873. 

The  recognition  that  we  were  on  a 
gold  basis  in  1853  and  intended  to  stay 
there  was  positive  and  unquestioned. 
The  coinage  of  the  nation  did  stay  on 
the  gold  basis  throughout  the  fifties 
and  up  to  the  suspension  of  specie  pay- 
ments. What  the  act  of  1873  did  was 
to  take  away  one  coin  that  had  not  cir- 
culated for  23  years  before  that  time 
and  that  constituted  no  part  of  the  mon- 
etary system  of  the  country. 

All  the  assertions  about  a  conspiracy 
to  wipe  out  half  the  standard  money  of 
the  country  are  shown  in  the  light  of 
these  facts  to  be  the  deliberate  and  per- 


14 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


sistent  fabrication  of  shallow  and  men- 
dacious demagoguery.  The  fondness  of 
the  cheap  money  men  for  the  fiat  theory 
has  led  them  into  the  production  of  a 
fiat  crime. 


IV.— A    Crime    of  tlie    Imagination. 

In  preceding  articles  The  Dispatch 
has  shown  from  the  coinage  statistics 
that  this  nation  did  not  before  1873  coin 
any  silver  worth  mentioning  except 
fractional  silver,  and  that  for  every  dol- 
lar of  annual  coinage  of  the  standard 
silver  dollars  before  that  date  it  has 
since  then  coined  over  two  hundred  and 
fifty  dollars. 

It  has  also  shown  that  the  demoneti- 
zation of  that  silver  coinage  which  ever 
formed  a  noticeable  part  of  our  money 
was  made  in  1853;  that  what  was  de- 
monetized in  1873  was  a  coin  which  nev- 
er constituted  one  per  cent  of  our  coin- 
age and  which  was  not  in  circulation  at 
the  passage  of  the  act;  that  the  purpose 
of  both  acts  was  clearly  stated  in  Con- 
gress at  the  time  of  their  passage,  and 
that  both  were  for  the  purpose  of  in- 
creasing the  use  of  silver  in  the  func- 
tions which  then  seemed  practicable. 

These  facts  are  a  complete  answer  to 
the  charge  that  the  action  of  the  United 
States  "struck  down  silver"  and  raised 
the  price  of  gold.  That  assertion  is  an 
essential  part  of  the  proposition  that 
the  United  States  by  its  solitary  action 
must  restore  silver.  The  facts  show 
that  if  silver  was  "struck  down"  the 
United  States  had  nothing  to  do  with 
it,  for  the  double  reason  that  it  had  no 
silver  to  strike  down,  and  that,  com- 
mencing with  the  act  of  1873,  it  has 
multiplied  its  silver  coinage,  first,  by 
9,  then  by  17,  and,  if  we  take  the  stand- 
ard of  comparison  which  the  free  silver 
men  assert  to  be  vital,  by  250.  We 
might,  be  content  to  rest  the  disproof  of 
"the  crime  of  1873"  there;  but,  since 
the  further  allegation  of  the  carrying 
out  of  a  conspiracy  in  Europe  is  made, 
and  since  the  facts  illustrate  some  im- 
portant principles  in  bimetallism,  it  is 
worth  while  to  go  over  that  phase  of 
the  subject  briefly. 


It  has  been  alleged  by  some  of  our 
free  silver  disputants  that  the  reason 
why  the  United  States  coined  practical- 
ly no  silver  dollars  prior  to  1873  was 
that  the  legal  ratio  was  16  to  1  in  our 
mints  and  only  15%  to  1  in  Europe. 
That  is  a  permissible  explanation  of 
tho  state  of  affairs  prior  to  1848,  and  it 
illustrates  the  hopelessness  of  one  gov- 
ernment attempting  to  maintain  a  ratio 
against  the  rate  of  the  world.  But  the 
fact  is  that  it  is  entirely  without  ap- 
plication in  the  period  after  California 
and  Australia  commenced  to  fill  the 
world  with  gold.  The  increase  of  the 
gold  supply  and  the  rise  in  silver  to  a 
premium,  bothered  the  coinage  opera- 
tions of  Europe  more  than  the  United 
States,  where  the  question  was  solved 
by  going  to  the  gold  basis  in  1853,  as 
we  have  shown. 

The  most  striking  illustration  of  that 
trouble  is  in  the  coinage  statistics  of 
France.  Prior  to  1850  France  and  the 
United  States  had  both  been  bimetallic 
In  name,  but  the  difference  in  ratio  had 
made  the  coinage  of  the  United  States 
practically  gold,  and  that  of  France 
practically  silver.  That  things  were 
not  left  that  way  is  shown  by  the  fol- 
lowing table  of  coinage  of  France  for 
20  years  before  and  20  years  after  1850: 
Before  1850. 

Gold,  Fr.     Silver,  Fr. 

1831-5   .103,268,680    822,313,995 

1836-40 73,732,160     381,024,689 

1841-5   19,915,780     379,160,698 

1846-50..,  .    161,792,130     538,909,545 


Total 358,708,750  2,121,408,927 

Annual  avg...    17,635,437  106,704,463 

Percentage..                14.1  85.9 
After  1850. 

Gold,  Fr.  Silver,  Fr. 

1851-5   1,583,657,880  178,969,433 

1856-60.. 2,700,683,070  83,331,375 

1860-5   958,419,620  21,886,059 

1866-70...         .    1,193,320,110  425,252,369 


Totals 6,436,080,680    709,439,236 

Annual  avg.     321,804,340        35,421,961 

Percentage..  90.3  9.7 

The  reversal  in  the  proportion  of  the 

two  metals  shown  by  the  averages  of 


15 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


the  two  periods  is  marked  enough.  Be- 
fore 1850  six-sevenths  of  the  French 
coinage  was  silver  and  only  one-sev- 
enth gold.  After  1850,  nine-tenths  of  it 
was  gold  and  only  one-tenth  silver. 
Yet  even  this  does  not  present  the  ex- 
treme change  shown  by  comparing 
some  of  the  five-year  periods.  From 
1841  to  1845  nineteen-twentieths  of  the 
French  coinage  was  silver,  and  in  the 
years  1856-60,  there  was  hardly  3  per 
cent  silver  and  97  per  cent  gold.  In 
other  words,  the  influx  of  new  gold  pro- 
duction practically  put  France  on  the 
gold  basis,  at  the  same  time  that  the 
United  States,  by  its  legislation  of  1853, 
recognized  that  it  was  there. 

France  is  the  largest  coin-using  na- 
tion in  the  civilized  class.  But  the  ef- 
fect of  the  great  gold  developments 
was  similar  upon  all  the  continental 
countries.  England  only  felt  the  ef- 
fect of  the  enlargement  of  its  single 
gold  basis  on  which  it  had  already  stood 
for  31  years.  But  throughout  the  con- 
tinental nations,  nearly  all  of  which 
were  silver  using,  it  was  revolutionary. 
France,  as  we  have  seen,  was  practical- 
ly shifted  to  the  gold  basis.  Belgium 
sought  to  protect  itself  from  the  change 
by  adopting  the  single  silver  standard 
in  1850.  Holland  followed  suit.  Ger- 
many and  Austria  did  the  same  thing 
in  1857,  and  Russia  saved  itself  trouble 
in  that  line  by  suspending  specie  pay- 
ments in  the  same  yeah  But  this  proved 
so  little  satisfactory  that  Belgium  got 
back  to  the  double  monetary  standard 
in  1861,  and  in  1865  the  attempt  at  in- 
ternational agreement  was  made  by  the 
Latin  Union,  composed  of  France,  Italy, 
Belgium,  Switzerland  and  subsequently 
Greece,  to  maintain  the  double  stand- 
ard. 

We  should  hardly  let  this  point  pass 
without  repeating  the  lesson  which  it 
affords  on  the  present  issue.  The  case 
was  identical  in  principle  with  that  for 
the  past  20  years,  except  that  the  posi- 
tion of  metals  was  reversed.  Gold  was 
then  the  metal  of  largest  relative  pro- 
duction and  consequently  the  cheaper. 
All  the  demand  of  practically  the  whole 
world  could  not  prevent  it  from  de- 


clining and  silver  going  to  a  premium. 
The  action  of  the  law  of  bimetallism  as 
than  defined  made  the  separation  of  the 
metals  less  radical  than  it  has  been  in 
the  later  era.  But  in  the  countries 
having  the  double  standard  it  was 
enough  for  gold  to  drive  silver  out, 
until  international  action  was  resorted 
to.  In  1859  silver  rose  to  a  premium 
of  nearly  4  per  cent,  above  the  15^  ra- 
tio. This  shows  the  utter  futility  of  any 
idea  that  a  single  nation  can,  by  unlim- 
ited coinage,  establish  value  to  a  money 
metal  other  than  that  created  by  the 
commercial  valuation  of  the  world's 
markets. 

The  situation  as  created  by  these  un- 
certainties and  shifting  from  one  stand- 
ard to  the  other  was  so  unsatisfactory 
that  the  first  international  monetary 
conference  was  held  at  Paris  in  1867, 
for  the  purpose  of  establishing  the 
siEgle  gold  standard  and  an  interna- 
tional coinage.  The  example  of  Eng- 
land strengthened  the  argument  in  fav- 
or of  that  course,  backed  as  it  was  by 
the  immensely  increased  supply  of  gold. 
The  agitation  at  that  time  was  at  first 
for  an  international  coin,  then  for  the 
single  gold  standard;  but  it  is  the  fact 
that  the  latter  was  urged  very  strongly. 
It  also  subsequently  appeared  that  the 
Governments  most  set  in  that  direc- 
tion were  the  German  powers  that  were 
usicg  the  single  silver  standard.  They 
were  determined  to  get  rid  of  it,  al- 
though the  measure  did  not  secure  uni- 
versal adoption. 

The  proposition  for  the  single  gold 
standard  was  vigorously  opposed  by 
Wolcwski  and  Courcelles  Seneuil  in  the 
conference,  supported  by  the  writings 
of  Seyd,  Cernuschi  and  De  Lavaley.  It 
is  worth  while  to  note  that  the  theories 
of  these  writers,  of  whom  Cernuschi 
applied  the  term  bimetallism  to  their 
system,  were  based  clearly  and  emphat- 
ically on  the  ground  that  a  universal 
or  at  least  a  large  international  agree- 
ment was  necessary  to  secure  the  con- 
current use  of  both  gold  and  silver,  and 
that  the  cause  of  real  bimetallism  rests 
on  that  ground  today.  We  are  inclined 
to  coincide  with  Prof.  Bastable's  opin- 


16 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


ion  expressed  in  his  Encyclopedia  Brit- 
annica  treatise,  that  subsequent  events 
went  far  to  prove  that  the  bimetallic 
opposition  to  the  proposition  was  well 
founded.  By  virtue  of  their  opposition 
the  demonetization  of  silver  was  not 
adopted  as  an  international  policy. 
Germany  and  the  Scandinavian  Union 
determined  to  do  it  on  their  own  ac- 
count. France  and  the  Latin  Union 
tried  to  maintain  the  double  standard; 
but  the  limitations  of  the  bimetallic 
theory  were  shown  by  the  fact  that  the 
Latin  Union  reached  in  less  than  10 
years  the  same  point  to  which  the  Uni- 
ted States  has  got  after  20  years  more, 
where  the  effort  to  keep  silver  at  par 
with  gold  forced  the  suspension  of  silver 
coinage. 

While  we  thus  avow  our  opinion  that 
the  movement  to  demonetize  silver  in 
1866,  which  developed  into  the  Ger- 
man demonetization  in  1870,  was  an  er- 
ror, the  facts  leading  up  to  that  move- 
ment are  undisputably  as  stated.  They 
contain  complete  disproof  of  the  stupid 
and  malicious  charge  that  all  the  Gov- 
ernments of  the  world  were  bought  up 
to  serve  the  purpose  of  a  monetary  con- 
spiracy, in  three  leading  facts,  to  which 
our  free  silver  friends  never  refer,  prob- 
ably through  ignorance. 

First — The  alleged  conspirators  did 
not  control  the  action  of  the  govern- 
ments of  Europe.  France,  Italy,  Bel- 
gium and  Spain,  the  Governments 
which  might  be  supposed  to  be  most 
capable  of  influence  by  the  imagined 
empire  of  plutocrats,  maintained  the 
double  standard  until  the  overwhelm- 
ing stock  of  silver  forced  them  to  limit 
its  coinage,  and  thus  practically  sus- 
tain their  silver  on  a  gold  basis.  Rus- 
sia and  Austria  did  not  come  to  the 
gold  basis  for  nearly  30  years  after 
that  date.  If  we  suppose  the  alleged 
conspirators  to  have  bought  up  any- 
thing they  must  therefore  have  suc- 
ceeded in  buying  up  Bismarck  and  the 
old  Emperor  William,  with  the  Govern- 
ments of  Denmark  and  Sweden.  But 
on  the  theory  that  the  supporters  of  the 
gold  standard  formed  a  conspiracy  of 


the  gold  "money  lords,"  two  further  re- 
markable facts  shine  out. 

Second — They  advocated  the  cheaper 
standard.  When  the  first  Paris  confer- 
ence met,  silver  was  at  a  premium  of 
about  1  per  cent  on  the  European  ratio 
and  4  per  cent  on  the  ratio  of  the  United 
States.  For  17  years  before,  it  had 
ranged  from  that  up  to  4  per  cent  in1 
Europe  and  7  per  cent  in  the  United 
States.  The  stock  free  silver  charge 
therefore  implies  the  self-contradiction 
that  the  conspirators  who  were  seek- 
ing to  raise  the  standard  and  thus  in- 
crease the  amount  of  debt  started  by 
taking  the  metal,  which,  on  the  condi- 
tions existing  then  and  for  two  dec- 
ades before,  would  reduce  the  standard 
and  decrease  debt. 

Third— They  took  the  most  abundant 
metal.  During  the  five  years,  1861-5, 
preceding  the  meeting  of  the  confer- 
ence, the  world's  production  of  gold 
had  been  $614,000,000  and  of  silver  $177,- 
000,000.  For  the  20  years  ending  with 
1870  the  production  of  gold  was  $2,- 
596,000,000,  and  of  silver,  $879,000,000. 
The  charge  that  there  was  a  conspiracy 
to  corner  the  money  of  the  world  is  re- 
vealed in  its  true  stupidity  by  the  fact 
that  the  metal  selected  was  the  one 
that  for  20  years  was  produced  to  near- 
ly three  times  the  quantity  of  the  metal 
rejected.  It  implies  that  the  "money 
lords"  had  not  intelligence  enough  to 
know  that — if  we  can  estimate  the 
mathematical  proportions  of  the  vary- 
ing impossibilities — it  was  three  times 
as  easy  to  corner  $800,000,000  of  silver 
as  $2,500,000,000  of  gold. 

The  advocates  of  the  gold  standard  in 
1867-70  did  not  advocate  it  because  it 
was  the  cheapest  metal;  they  .did  not 
uphold  it  because  it  was  the  most  abun- 
dant, but  because  it  was  in  most  gen- 
eral use  and  because  it  was  the  most 
convenient  for  the  monetary  uses  de- 
sired. We  agree  with  the  European  bi- 
metallists  that  the  policy  was  a  mis- 
take. But  as  bearing  on  the  stupid  and 
demagogical  slander  that  the  legisla- 
tion of  the  world  was  under  the  dic- 
tation of  the  moneyed  kings  to  corner 
the  money  of  the  world  these  two  facts 


17 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


are  indisputable  and  completely  dispel 
the  slander. 

First— The  United  States  had  nothing 
to  do  with  the  striking  down  of  silver, 
because  prior  to  1873  it  had  no  silver 
coinage  in  its  redemption  money,  and 
since  1873  it  has  increased  its  silver 
coinage  to  an  amount  which  largely  off- 
sets the  displacement  of  silver  in  Eu- 
rope. 

Second— While  the  European  move- 
ment to  gold  did  increase  the  deprecia- 
tion of  silver  in  conjunction  with  the 
subsequent  multiplication  of  produc- 
tion, the  assertion  that  it  was  done  to 
corner  the  money  of  the  world  is  rid- 
dled through  and  through  by  the  simple 
fact  that  if  there  had  been  any  such 
bass  and  criminal  purpose  it  would  have 
taken  the  metal  of  which  the  production 
for  20  years  before  had  been  little 
more  than  one-quarter  the  total  pro- 
duction of  monetary  metals. 

These  facts  put  all  the  tirades  about 
"the  crime  of  1873"  in  their  true  light 
as  the  circulation  of  a  persistent  and 
malignant  falsehood. 

*    *    * 

V. — Bimetallism    or    Monometallism. 

Two  of  the  free  silver  correspondents 
of  The  Dispatch,  in  beginning  the  dis- 
cussion concerning  the  results  of  free 
silver  coinage,  take  up  the  question 
whether  the  opening  of  the  mints  of  the 
United  States  to  the  free  coinage  of  sil- 
ver, while  the  mints  of  all  other  lead- 
ing commercial  nations  remain  closed, 
would  depreciate  the  standard  dollar 
to  the  market  value  of  the  bullion,  or 
would  raise  the  market  v^me  of  the 
bullion  to  the  present  value  of  the  dol- 
lar. This  is  a  very  important  question, 
as  it  involves  the  issues  whether  we 
will  have  a  depreciation  of  the  stand- 
ard; whether  the  change  will  be  to  real 
bimetallism  or  whether  it  will  be  ac- 
tually to  silver  monometallism,  with 
the  contraction  of  the  currency  that 
must  result  from  driving  gold  out  of 
circulation. 

One  of  the  correspondents  who  takes 
up  the  argument  that  free  coinage  will 
raise  silver  to  parity  with  gold,  starts 


with  the  thesis,  "We  want  real  bimet- 
allism. "  There  is  no  dispute  on  that 
point  between  our  contributor  and  The 
Dispatch,  which  has  for  years  held  the 
position  assumed  by  the  Republican 
platform.  But  the  question  is  whether 
real  bimetallism  can  be  obtained  by 
giving  the  right  of  unlimited  coinage 
to  silver  at  a  rate  that  will  permit  sil- 
ver bullion  to  be  coined  into  dollars  at 
half  the  cost  of  gold  dollars.  It  would 
seem  as  a  prima  facie  statement,  that 
such  a  condition  will  ensure  that  every 
one  will  pay  out  the  silver  dollars  that 
can  be  obtained  so  cheaply,  and  with- 
hold the  gold,  or  ship  it  to  the  countries 
where  he  can  get  twice  the  amount  of 
silver  for  it.  If  a  man  has  $100,000  to 
pay,  he  will  not  pay  it  in  gold,  even  if 
he  should  have  the  $100,000  of  gold  in 
his  safe,  so  long  as  by  sending  $50,000 
of  that  gold  to  London  he  can  get 
enough  silver  dollars  to  pay  the  debt 
and  have  $50,000  of  gold  left. 

But  as  the  free  silver  advocates  pre- 
sent arguments  that  the  privilege  of 
coinage  by  the  United  States  mints  will 
raise  silver  to  equality  with  the  pres- 
ent standard,  we  will  take  up  the  argu- 
ments as  presented,  and  examine  the 
foundation  which  they  afford  for  that 
idea. 

Two  arguments  are  advanced  by  them 
which,  while  differing  in  form,  are  prac- 
tically the  same  in  meaning.  One  pre- 
sented by  Mr.  K ,  is  that  as  the 

Government  collects  $600,000,000  a 
year  in  taxes,  it  is  "stuff"  to  say,  as 
Postmaster  General  Wilson  does,  that 
under  free  coinage  "no  gold  coin  would 
be  issued,  because  with  the  bullion  nec- 
essary to  coin  a  gold  dollar  could  be 
purchased  enough  silver  to  coin  two  sil- 
ver dollars." 

This  argument  betrays  the  typical 
looseness  of  the  free  silver  advocate  in 
the  statement  of  facts.  The  Government 
has  not  collected  $600,000,000  revenue 
in  any  year  for  30  years.  If  the  asser- 
tion is  intended  to  cover  all  taxation,  it 
is  equally  loose  in  being  as  much  too 
small.  That  it  is  entirely  inappropriate 
is  shown  by  one  clause  of  his  letter. 
That  is  the  assertion  that  for  the  pay- 


18 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


inent  of  these  taxes  "silver  would  take 
the  place  of  gold"  and  therefore  afford 
an  increased  use  of  silver.  The  fact 
happens  to  be  that  all  municipal,  county 
and  State  taxes  can  be  paid  in  silver  to- 
day. Further  than  that,  nearly  one- 
half  of  the  revenue  of  the  United  States 
can  be  paid  in  silver,  and  the  only  thing 
that  prevents  the  payment  of  the  other 
half  is  the  custom  established  30  years 
ago  of  paying  duties  in  gold.  So  that 
Mr.  K—  — 's  $600,000,000  of  increased 
use  for  silver  under  free  coinage,  sim- 
mers doWn  to  actually  nothing  under 
the  strict  law,  and  about  $15,000,000  to 
$18,000,000  per  month  on  the  most  lib- 
eral basis. 

The  only  reason  why,  with  free  coin- 
age, people  would  use  silver  for  these 
and  other  payments,  more  than  they 
now  do,  would  be  that  they  could  get 

it  cheaper.  Mr.  K ,  therefore,  has 

to  argue  a  depreciation  of  the  standard, 
in  order  to  predicate  the  increased  de- 
mand for  silver. 

The  contention  that  the  receipt  of  sil- 
ver dollars  for  Government  revenue 
would  give  them  the  same  value  as  gold 
dollars,  has  this  foundation.  If  the  is- 
sue of  silver  dollars  were  limited  to 
the  amount  needed  to  pay  these  taxes, 
they  would  be  sustained  at  par.  The 
fact  is  that  by  this  and  other  devices 
the  United  States  is  now  sustaining  at 
par  a  large  volume  of  silver.  France 
is  doing  the  same;  but  both  nations 
found  that  the  continuance  of  coinage 
would  land  them  on  the  single  silver 
basis.  The  very  proposition  -of  free  and 
unlimited  coinage  carries  the  matter  far 
beyond  the  hope  of  sustaining  silver 
at  a  parity  with  gold.  That  means  that 
anyone  having  a  debt  to  pay  and  having 
the  gold  to  pay  it  with  can  buy  silver 
with  half  his  gold,  have  silver  dollars 
coined  to  pay  the  debt,  and  keep  the 
other  half  of  the  gold  as  a  profit. 

There  is  a  very  simple  and  very  con- 
clusive test  of  the  claim  that  the  ability 
to  pay  duties  and  excise  taxes  in  sil- 
ver would  make  a  silver  dollar  as  val- 
uable as  a  gold  dollar.  That  is  the  test 
of  fact.  In  Mexico  the  Government  rev- 
enues are  all  payable  in  silver,  and 


they1  have  less  silver  in  proportion  to 
population  and  general  taxation  than 
the  United  States  has  today.  Is  the 
Mexican  dollar  equal  in  value  to  the 
gold  dollar?  Go  into  Mexico  with  100 
'United  States  dollars  and  you  will  get 
190  Mexican  dollars  in  exchange.  China 
collects  all  revenues  in  silver.  Is  silver 
at  par  with  gold  in  China  on  the  ratio 
of  16  to  1?  All  the- revenues  of  India 
come  in  silver.  Did  that  prevent  the 
dcpi-eciation  of  silver? 

The  argument  of  "Bimetallist"  is  the 
same  as  that  just  noticed,  only  put  in 
a  broader  form,  ft  is  that  the  monetary 
demand  of  the  United  States  for  silver 
would  be  so  great  that  it  would  take  all 
the  silver  offered  at  par  with  gold.  This 
is  amplified  by  the  assertion  that  if 
the  $3,500,000,000  of  silver  held  abroad 
at  the  present  market  price  of  69  cents 
per  ounce,  should  flow  to  this  country, 
the  United  States  could  well  afford  to 
take  it,  and  pay  for  it  in  domestic 
products,  thereby  adding  to  the  sale  of 
our  merchandise. 

It  is  easy  to  make  assertions  such  as 
that  the  United  States  can  take  all  the 
silver  in  the  world  at  $1.29  per  ounce, 
and  keep  it  at  par  with  gold  by  selling 
domestic  products  for  silver.  But  the 
fact  i£  that  we  need  the  great  bulk  of 
our  surplus  products  to  purchase  things 
that  we  need  from  abroad.  If  the  plan 
of  accepting  all  the  silver  in  the  world 
at  $1.29  per  ounce  in  exchange  for  our 
products  were  put  into  effect,  the  peo- 
ple might  object  that  they  could  not 
drink  silver  in  place  of  coffee  or  tea, 
could  not  sweeten  their  food  with  it  in 
place  of  sugar,  take  it  for  sickness  in 
place  of  medicines,  or  smoke  it  in  place 
of  cigars  or  tobacco.  It  is  in  pur- 
chasing these  and  other  articles  of  con- 
sumption that  75  per  cent  of  our  sur- 
plus products  are  used.  The  proposi- 
tion to  stop  consuming  them  in  order 
that  we  may  accumulate  thousands  of 
millions  of  silver  from  abroad,  at  twice 
its  present  value,  will,  if  properly  un- 
derstood, raise  some  dissent. 

The  entire  contention  of  our  free  sil- 
ver friends  is  that  the  demand  of  the 
United  States  alone  will  be  so  great  that 


19 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


it  will  raise  the  price  of  silver  in  the 
markets  of  the  world  from  69c  to  $1.29 
per  ounce.  If  the  statement  were  that 
free  coinage  all  over  the  world  would 
do  it,  there  would  be  some  show  of 
reason  for  it,  although  it  would  not  be 
entirely  correct,  as  we  have  previously 
shown.  But  the  proposition  is  that  the 
United  States,  comprising  less  than  5 
per  cent  of  the  money-using  population 
of  the  world,  can  do  it  all  alone.  And 
onr  friends  expect  us  to  accept  that 
simply  on  the  strength  of  their  sheer 
assertion! 

They  do  not  find  it  convenient  to  take 
any  notice  of  the  facts  showing  the 
experience  of  the  world  to  the  contrary. 
But  facts  are  the  sole  demonstration. 
We  propose  to  add  a  couple  more  proofs; 
one  oi!  them  coextensive  with  the  coun- 
try which  they  assert  to  be  able  to  raise 
the  price  of  silver  by  itself,  the  other 
coextensive  with  the  trade  of  the  world. 
Since  it  is  asserted  that  the  United 
States  by  its  solitary  action  can  double 
the  value  of  silver,  it  is  worth  while 
to  inquire  what  the  United  States  has 
done.  Prior  to  1873  the  United  States 
had  coined  8,000,000  silver  dollars.  Since 
then  it  has  coined  and  purchased  over 
550,000,000.  During  the  period  when  the 
United  States  coined  50  dollars  for  every 
one  that  it  had  coined  before,  what  did 
the  market  price  of  silver  do?  As  it 
declined  from  $1.29  to  65c  per  ounce, 
does  not  the  assertion  that  the  United 
States  can  control  the  matter  sink  to 
the  level  of  utter  fatuity? 

The  other  demonstration  is  even  more 
universal.  The  assertion  is  that  the 
demand  for  a  money  metal  is  so  uni- 
versal that  it  will  keep  up  the  price 
irrespective  of  the  supply.  Whatever 
may  be  claimed  for  the  use  of  silver 
in  the  United  States  under  free  coin- 
age, no  sane  man  will  assert  that  it 
will  be  so  universal  as  the  world-wide 
demand  for  gold.  Yet  the  fact  is  that 
within  the  memory  of  half  the  present 
generation  the  large  increase  in  the  pro- 
duction of  gold  made  a  sweeping  re- 
duction in  its  purchasing  power.  If  the 
demand  of  the  whole  world  for  the  two 
decades  succeeding  1850  did  not  keep 


up  the  value  of  gold,  reckoned  in  pur- 
chasing power,  what  utter  nonsense  it 
is  to  assert  that  it  can  be  done  for  sil- 
ver by  the  demand  of  a  single  country, 
particularly  when  that  nation  has  al- 
ready in  the  past  18  years  coined  seven- 
teen times  as  much  of  all  silver  coins, 
and  fifty  times  as  many  silver  dol- 
lars as  it  did  in  the  entire  century  prior 
to  1873. 

It  is  a  peculiar  attribute  of  our  free 
silver  friends  that  they  can  recognize 
the  relations  of  supply  and  demand 
where  it  suits  them,  but  are  unable  to 
make  the  same  recognition  Where  it 
does  not  meet  the  exigencies  of  their 
argument.  With  regard  to  gold,  in  as- 
serting that  its  price  has  advanced 
since  1873,  they  can  see  that  what 
changes  value  is  the  altered  relation  of 
supply  and  demand;  but  with  regard  to 
silver  they  fail  to  see  that  the  presence 
of  an  immense  supply  at  a  stated  price 
makes  it  ridiculous  to  suppose  tnat  the 
demand  of  a  single  nation  can  raise  the 
value.  They  ignore  the  plain  showing 
of  the  statistics  that  the  action  of  the 
United  States  has  not  depreciated  sil- 
ver, but  has  demonstrated  its  inability 
to  advance  it.  They  ignore  the  fact  that 
the  world's  production  of  silver,  as 
shown  in  the  following  table,  by  five- 
year  periods,  side  by  side  with  the  av- 
erage price  per  ounce  for  each  period, 
indicates  one  great  cause  of  the  decline 
of  silver. 

Average 
Production.    Price. 

1851-5     $184,169,000    1 . 34 

1856-60 188,092,000     1.35 

1S61-5     228,861,000    1.33% 

1866-70 278,313,000    1.33 

1871-5     409,322,000    1.29V2 

1876-80 509,256,000    1 . 15y2 

1881-5     594,773,000    1.11 

1886-90  704,047,000        97% 

1891-5     912,816,000        78y2 

Highest  average  for  year,  $1.36,  in 
1859;  lowest,  63%c,  in  1894. 

Can  anyone  observe  the  steady  in- 
crease in  the  production  of  silver  from 
an  annual  average  of  $36,834,000,  in 
1851-5,  to  nearly  five  times  the  amount 
40  years  later,  accompanied  by  the  de- 


20 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


cline  in  price  as  the  accumulation  grew 
and  retain  any  doubt  as  to  the  great 
cause  which  has  reduced  the  price  of  sil- 
ver? That  other  causes  may  have  co- 
operated is  not  disputed;  but  that  this 
multiplication  of  the  production  is  the 
chief  one,  is  beyond  question. 

These  are  the  considerations  which 
show  that  the  pending  proposition  for 
free  coinage  is  not  genuine  bimetallism, 
but  silver  monometallism.  No  stronger 
or  more  authoritative  corroboration  of 
that  position  could  be  desired  than  the 
article  of  Dr.  Otto  Arendt  in  the  North 
American  Review  on  "The  Outlook  for 
Silver." 

Otto  Arendt  is  one  of  the  leaders  of 
the  German  bimetallists.  He  has  fought 
for  the  restoration  of  silver  in  Europe 
by  international  agreement  when  the 
cause  seemed  hopeless,  and  he  con- 
tinues his  advocacy  when  the  move- 
ment has  gained  imposing  strength. 
His  article  is  devoted  to  showing  the 
progress  that  has  been  made  and  the 
causes  which  hamper  its  movement  to 
complete  success.  With  regard  to  the 
latter,  his  article  contains  the  follow- 
ing, which  should  arrest  the  careful  at- 
tention of  every  man  who  understands 
the  value  of  genuine  bimetallism: 

"If  it  is  now  desired  to  perpetuate 
the  gold  standard  in  Europe,  let  the 
Government  at  Washington  adopt  free 
coinage  of  silver  at  the  ratio  of  1:16. 
At  present,  after  the  closure  of  the  In- 
dian mints,  this  step  could  not  possibly 
have  any  other  result  than  to  make  the 
American  standard  a  silver  standard. 
The  price  of  silver  of  course  would  rise, 
but  not  to  59  pence,  and  not  permanent- 
ly. The  United  States  would  have  a 
standard  not  materially  different  from 
that  of  Mexico.  All  the  disadvantages 
and  all  the  advantages  of  a  fluctuating 
and  depreciated  money  standard  would 
follow.  Gold  monometallism  would  be 
replaced  by  silver  monometallism;  the 
double  standard  would  become  nomin- 
al. No  bimetallism  can  approve  of 
this." 

Further  solid  truths  on  the  same 
point  are  expressed  by  Dr.  Arendt.  He 
says,  "The  United  States  alone  cannot 


efitablish  the  double  standard  by  adopt- 
ing free  coinage;  they  would  shift  over 
to  the  silver  standard,  and  we  would 
vainly  wait  for  a  stable  ratio  of  values." 

Finally  he  states  the  reality  of  the 
case  in  the  following  inclusive  words: 

"Only  by  insisting  in  all  countries  in 
an  unequivocal  manner  on  the  interna- 
tional solution  of  the  currency  ques- 
tion, can  international  bimetallism  be 
attained.  'No  more  experiments!'  is 
therefore  the  only  appeal  which  the 
European  bimetallists  address  to  those 
of  America;  no  silver  purchases,  no  sil- 
ver coinage,  otherwise  than  on  the  basis 
of  international  agreement;  and  no 
more  abortive  attempts  to  bring  them 
about." 

This  is  the  opinion  of  all  who  have 
carefully  studied  the  question  in  its  in- 
ternational bearing.  Henri  Cernuschi 
insisted  that  free  coinage  by  the  United 
States  would  indefinitely  postpone  in- 
ternational bimetallism.  This  is  the 
opinion  of  the  present  English  Bimetallic 
League,  and  its  converse  has  been  sig- 
nally proved  by  the  events  of  the  past 
three  years. 

The  argument  might  be  lengthened, 
but  the  foregoing  is  sufficient  to  prove 
the  utter  factitiousness  of  the  idea. 
Free  silver  coinage  means  the  scaling 
down  of  the  dollar  to  the  bullion  value 
of  silver. 


Their    Ground. 

The  arguments  previously  presented* 
on  the  claim  of  the  free  silver  contrib- 
utors, that  free  coinage  by  the  solitary 
action  of  the  United  States  would  not 
depreciate  the  value  of  the  dollar  to 
the  market  value  of  silver  bullion  in  it, 
produces  a  large  number  of  replies.  But 
it  is  characteristic  of  those  replies,  that 
while  attempting  to  mitigate  the  force 
of  those  arguments,  they  practically  ad- 
mit their  effectiveness  by  shifting  their 
ground  to  another  branch  of  the  dis- 
cussion. 

Mr.  K  -  's  communication  pre- 
sents a  characteristic  jumping  from  one 
point  to  another.  He  started  out  with 
a  certain  proposition,  namely,  that  the 
receipt  by  the  Government  of  $600,000,- 


21 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM 


000  of  taxes  would  prevent  the  silver 
dollar  from  declining  at  all.  The  Dis- 
patch showed  first  the  inaccuracy  of 
his  figures,  and  second,  that  in  free 
coinage  countries  where  silver  is  used 
to  pay  all  the  taxes  the  silver  dollar 
is  worth  just  about  half  the  dollar  of 
the  United  States.  Mr.  K —  —  did  not 
find  it  convenient  to  answer  the  latter 
and  most  vital  point,  but  shifted  his 
position  by  intimating  that  he  meant 
all  kinds  of  taxes,  and  that  the  fact 
that  "silver  would  take  the  place  of 
gold"  in  such  payments  would  keep  it 
at  "the  price  of  $1.29  per  ounce,  the 
same  as  it  was  in  1873."  When  it  was 
shown  in  reply  that  all  these  payments 
can  be  made  in  silver  now,  and  that 
the  only  reason  why  people  would  buy 
a  thousand  or  a  hundred  thousand  dol- 
lars of  silver  to  make  a  payment  under 
free  coinage  would  be  that  they  could 
get  the  silver  cheaper,  he  skips  off  to 
another  position  and  exclaims,  "True, 
and  silver  is  at  par  with  gold!" 

It  would  be  the  simplest  way  to 
answer  Mr.  K —  -  in  his  own  style  of 
argumentation  by  asking,  since  that  is 
the  case,  why  does  he  want  a  change 
except  to  make  the  silver  dollar  cheap- 
er? We  must,  however,  instance  an- 
other point  of  the  same  character.  The 
self-chosen  position  of  these  correspon- 
dents, maintained  throughout  various 
communications,  was  that  a  single  na- 
tion—the United  States— could,  by  its 
own  monetary  demand,  sustain  the 
price  of  silver  at  par  with  gold.  The 
Dispatch  showed  that  not  only  a  single 
nation  could  not,  but  that  the  whole 
world  could  not,  by  the  simple  fact  that 
tho  monetary  demand  of  the  whole 
world  failed  to  sustain  the  purchasing 
power  of  gold  after  1850.  Our  corre- 
spondent considers  it  logic  to  jump  to 
another  point  and  to  another  issue  by 
asserting  that  the  ratio  between  gold 
andtsilver  did  not  vary,  and  that  the 
depreciation  of  gold  brought  prosperity. 

We  are  entirely  willing  to  let  Mr. 

K go  to  these  points,  but  only 

with  the  specific  understanding  that  his 
flight  to  them  indicates  the  abandon- 
ment of  his  original  and  self-chosen 


position,  and  that  having  started  with 
the  assertion  that  silver  under  free' 
coinage  would  be  kept  at  $1.29  per 
ounce,  he  now  admits  that  it  would 
start  to  make  some  decline,  but  that 
the  increased  use  would  offset  it.  As 
the  United  States  now  has  over  $500,- 
000,000  of  silver,  and  as  $3,500,000,000 
is  elsewhere  in  the  world,  ready  to  come 
in  at  the  price  of  $1.29,  the  exact  power 
of  the  increased  use  already  shown  to 
be  non-existent,  unless  the  money  is 
cheaper,  to  advance  the  $4,000,000,000 
nearly  100  per  cent  can  be  estimated 
by  any  sensible  man  to  suit  himself. 

In  jumping  away  from  the  question 
which  had  became  untenable  to  the  as- 
sertion that  in  the  monetary  move- 
ments from  1850  to  1870  the  ratio  be- 
tween gold  and  silver  did  not  vary,  Mr. 
K —  —  again  displays  his  need  for  ex- 
act information.  It  is  to  be  noted  that 
this  question  transfers  the  discussion 
to  what  can  be  done  by  the  operation  of 
demand  and  supply  over  the  whole 
world.  This  is  a  radically  different 
proposition  from  the  one  that  the  Unr* 
ted  States  can  establish  the  parity  all 
by  itself.  The  Dispatch  has  constantly 
held  that  the  world-wide  demand  can, 
under  wise  international  action,  estab- 
lish bimetallism.  But  while  it  is  true 
that  this  genuinely  universal  demand, 
and  not  the  demand  of  a  single  nation, 
can  minimize  the  relative  fluctuations 
of  the  two  metals,  any  bimetallic  writ- 
ers who  claim  that  it  can  prevent  them 
altogether,  simply  betray  their  ignor- 
ance. The  whole  history  of  coinage 
consists  of  the  record  of  the  changes 
in  the  ratio  from  the  original  10  to  1 
down  to  16  to  1,  when  further  altera- 
tions were  avoided  by  the  resort  to 
monometallism.  The  particular  case 
in  point  illustrates  the  subject.  The 
rise  in  silver  during  the  fifties  and  six- 
ties was  minimized  by  the  influence  to 

which  Mr.  K refers — which  is  a 

real  one  when  given  the  world-wide 
scope — but  could  not  prevent  the  price 
of  silver  rising  as  high  as  3  to  4  per 
cent  in  Europe  and  6  to  7  per  cent  in 
the  United  States.  The  consequences  of 
that  rise  were  vast.  In  England,  al- 


22 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


ready  on  the  gold  basis,  it  did  not  have 
a  direct  effect.  The  United  States  was 
confined  long  before  1873  to  the  gold 
basis  by  the  rise  in  silver.  Holland 
adopted  the  single  silver  standard  to 
guard  against  the  depreciation  of  gold. 
The  records  of  the  change  were  most 
sensational  in  the  coinage  statistics  of 
France,  already  cited.  Prom  1830  to 
1850,  86  per  cent  of  the  coinage  in 
France  was  in  silver  and  14  per  cent  in 
gold.  From  1850  to  1870  over  90  per 
cent  of  the  coinage  was  in  gold,  and 
less  than  10  per  cent  in  silver.  France 
went  to  the  gold  basis  then,  in  fact, 
though  not  in  theory,  side  by  side  with 
the  United  States,  and  both  are  side 
by  side  today. 

Mr.  N wishes  to  know  why  we 

beg  the  question  of  assuming  that^the 
gold  dollar  is  the  right  standard.'  If 
that  gentleman  were  able  to  recognize 
the  course  which  the  discussion  has 
been  given,  not  by  The  Dispatch,  but 
by  the  free  silver  men,  he  would  know 
that  the  only  thing  The  Dispatch  has 
assumed  is  that  the  grold  standard  is 
the  present  standard.  No  one  has  yet 
disputed  that  position;  and  the  debate 
has  been  whether  free  coinage  would 
change  the  standard  or  not.  The  orig- 
inal claim  of  two  advocates  of  free 
coinage,  that  the  silver  dollar  would 
remain  of  equal  value  with  the  gold, 
was  so  important  and  pivotal  that  The 
Dispatch  sought  to  have  that  fully  set- 
tled before  proceeding  to  discuss  the 
moral  and  financial  effects  of  a  change 
of  standard. 

Its  reference  to  the  experience  of  the 
silver-using  countries  of  the  world  dur- 
ing the  past  20  years,  and  to  the  exper- 
ience of  the  whole  world  40  years  ago, 
as  refuting  the  idea  that  the  monetary 
demand  of  a  sinsrle  nation  can  prevent 
the  decline  in  value  of  any  money  metal 
has  not  yet  been  answered.  The  fail- 
ure to  answer  it  permits  the  conclusion 
that  the  point  is  unanswerable;  but  as 
ona  other  correspondent  does  not  quite 
accept  the  conclusion,  we  will  give  a 
little  more  space  to  it.  The  communi- 
cation signed  "James  Edward"  sug- 
p-ests  that  the  "silver  barons"  will  r<=»~- 


ulate  production  and  keep  the  price  up 
to  $1.29  per  ounce.  The  alleged  silver 
barons  have  for  years  egregiously  failed 
to  keep  the  price  of  silver  above  70 
cents  per  ounce,  and  many  of  them  have 
idle  mines,  which  they  would  be  glad 
to  start  when  they  can  get  75  or  80 
cents.  Whether  our  correspondent  pre- 
sents the  idea  to  support  free  coinage, 
or  the  reverse,  is  not  quite  plain;  but 
the  proposition  to  alter  the  coinage  law 
for  the  sole  profit  of  the  silver  barons 
would,  if  well  founded,  sufficiently  rank 
itself. 

How  little  foundation  there  is  for  it 
may  be  seen  from  the  following  figures: 
Suppose  the  alleged  silver  barons  could 
control  the  production  of  silver  in  this 
country — which  they  can't — their  share 
of  the  market  would  be  about  $75,000,- 
000.  There  is  $125,000,000  more  pro- 
duced annually  in  other  parts  of  the 
world.  Besides  this,  there  is  an  accum- 
ulated monetary  stock  of  over  $4,000,- 
000,  or  the  equivalent  of  20  years'  pro- 
duction, and  in  addition  to  that,  un- 
coined silver  and  silver  plate  to  an  al- 
most incalculable  amount.  The  idea 
that  an  imaginary  control  of  less  than  2 
per  cent  of  this  entire  stock  can  con- 
trol the  price  of  the  whole  is  almost 
pathetic  in  its  innocence.  The  price 
now  fixed  for  this  metal,  by  the  fact 
that  it  is  what  people  will  buy  and 
sell  it  for  all  over  the  world,  is  69  cents 
per  ounce. 

If  these  facts  are  appreciated,  it  will 
be  seen  that,  to  use  our  correspondent's 
figures,  the  question  is  not  whether  if 
anything  were  worth  100  cents  in  Phila- 
delphia it  could  he  bought  in  Pittsburg 
for  50  cents,  but  whether  if  it  were 
worth  50  cents  in  Pittsburg  and  every- 
where else,  anyone  in  Philadelphia 
would  be  foolish  enough  to  buy  it  for 
100  cents.  Suppose  that  Pittsburg  or 
the  whole  country  had  350,000,000  tons 
of  pig  iron,  valued  at  $12  per  ton,  and 
the  united  wealth  of  Philadelphia 
should  undertake  to  buy  pig  iron  at 
$24  per  ton.  How  long  would  it  be  be- 
fore the  wealth  of  Philadelphia  would 
consist  entirely  of  pig  iron  worth  ex- 
the  $12  per  ton  at  which  the  oper- 


23 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


ation  started?  That  is  the  business 
proposition  of  those  who  assert  that  the 
United  States  can  legislate  the  value  of 
silver  up  to  $1.29  per  ounce  in  gold. 
It  is  so  impossible  that  we  do  not 
believe  the  free  coinage  of  silver  would 
bring  much  foreign  metal  to  this  coun- 
try, for  the  simple  reason  that  as  soon 
as  it  went  into  effect,  the  purchasing 
power  of  our  dollar  would  fall  to  the 
parity  of  the  bullion  value  of  silver  in 
the  world's  markets. 

"Bimetallist"  makes  a  further  at- 
tempt to  sustain  the  same  professed 
basis  of  belief  that  free  coinage  by  the 
United  States  alone  will  raise  the  price 
of  silver  to  the  parity  of  gold.  He  has 
found  nothing  to  say  in  answer  to  The 
Dispatch's  citation  of  the  fact  that  the 
demand  of  China,  Japan,  Mexico  and 
South  America,  constituting  many 
times  the  population  of  the  United 
States,  has  not  sufficed  to  maintain  the 
price  of  silver,  nor  to  the  other  and 
more  crushing  proof,  that  the  demand 
of  the  whole  world  for  gold  could  not 
sustain  its  price  against  the  increase 
from  Californian  and  Australian  mines 
in  the  fifties  and  sixties.  These  world- 
wide facts,  showing  that  legislation 
cannot  prevent  the  action  of  demand 
and  supply  on  the  value  of  monetary 
metals  any  more  than  on  anything  else, 
he  leaves  unanswered;  but  develops  in- 
stead some  very  peculiar  arguments 
which  call  for  a  short  notice. 

One  is  that  remarkable  theory  of  the 
United  States'  exchanging  its  products 
for  all  the  silver  of  the  world.  His  ar- 
gument that  we  can  deal  with  silver 
nations  more  advantageously  when  we 
adopt  silver  Is  a  remarkable  Inconsis- 
tency after  he  has  in  the  same  article 
indorsed  the  position  of  The  Dispatch 
that  the  coinage  of  one  country  does  not 
materially  affect  the  exchanges  of  In- 
ternational commerce.  But  It  goes  still 
further  Into  the  realms  of  the  grotesque 
in  the  light  of  the  fact  that  our  foreign 
commerce  at  present  consists  of  selling 
the  largest  share  of  our  products  to 
gold  countries  in  order  that  we  may 
buy  products  from  all  countries,  wheth- 
er they  are  gold  or  silver.  It  Is  writ- 


ten apparently  in  ignorance  of  the  fact 
that  in  1894  we  sold  $419,000,000  of  prod- 
ucts to  Great  Britain  and  Ireland  and 
took  but  $106,000,000  of  merchandise  in 
return.  In  other  words,  by  selling  to 
the  United  Kingdom,  we  got  a  balance 
of  $312,000,000,  with  which  we  paid  a 
balance  the  other  way  of  $66,000,000  in 
our  trade  with  Brazil;  $55,000,000  in  our 
trade  with  Cuba;  of  $16,000,000  with 
Mexico;  $16,000,000  with  Japan;  $12,000,- 
000  with  China,  and  so  on  through  a 
long  list  of  lesser  amounts. 

It  is  putting  the  discussion  into  the 
category  of  humorous  literature,  when 
our  correspondent  proposes  that  we 
shall  increase  the  products  with  which 
we  are  to  buy  the  world's  stock  of  silver 
by  working  90  days  more  each  year. 
Inasmuch  as  just  about  75  per  cent  of 
our  exports  are  agricultural  products, 
the  proposition  of  our  friend  that  the 
farmers  shall  sow  wheat  In  December 
and  harvest  corn  and  cotton  in  the  bliz- 
zards of  February,  Is  interesting  and 
likely  to  contribute  to  the  gayety  of  the 
issue. 

But  even  that  play  of  the  imagination 
is  matched  by  another  feature  of  the 
same  idea.  The  proposition  which  our 
correspondent  is  maintaining,  for  the 
time  being,  is  that  silver  is  to  be  main- 
tained at  a  parity  with  gold  under  free 
coinage,  by  the  United  States  taking  all 
the  silver  of  the  world  at  $1.29  per 
oun<*e  in  gold.  At  present  the  United 
States  can,  with  the  exportable  surplus 
that  it  Is  able  to  produce,  buy  silver 
in  the  world's  markets  at  68  to  69  cents 
per  ounce.  That  is  practically  what  Is 
done  in  the  settlement  of  balances 
through  England,  with  the  silver  coun- 
tries'of  which  we  buy  sugar,  coffee,  tea 
and  spices.  The  proposition,  therefore, 
is  that  the  United  States  shall  pay  twice 
as  much  for  silver  as  it  now  does,  on  the 
exchange  of  its  products.  With  the 
products  that  now  buy  a  million  ounces 
of  silver,  It  Is  to  buy  only  a  little  more 
than  half  a  million  ounces.  This  means 
that  we  are  to  get  about  half  as  much 
for  our  products!  Yet  the  Inventor  of 
this  remarkable  proposition  asserts 
that  what  he  wants  is  to  raise  prices! 


24 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM 


This  is  closely  matched  by  an  argu- 
ment produced  and  widely  circulated 
within  the  past  few  weeks,  by  a  silver 
champion  much  more  prominent  than 
our  correspondent,  but  who,  we  really 
believe,  is  less  intelligent.  The  Hon. 
Richard  Bland,  of  Missouri,  made  the 
declaration  that  when  the  United  States 
opens  its  mints  to  the  free  coinage  of 
silver,  all  the  silver  of  India  and  China 
will  be  advanced  to  par  with  gold,  be- 
cause anyone  would  be  foolish  to  sell 
his  silver  for  less  than  the  United  States 
mints  would  give.  The  holders  of  silver 
in  China  and  Japan  will  demand  $1.29 
per  ounce  for  their  silver,  Mr.  Bland 
alleges,  because  they  can  get  that  at 
the  United  States  mints.  This  implies 
that  the  American  people  will  supply 
the  mints  with  the  means  to  pay  India 
and  China  for  some  $1,700,000,000  in 
silver,  to  say  nothing  of  about  $1,800,- 
000,000  in  the  other  parts  of  the  world. 
But  how  will  the  United  States  pay 
for  these  very  good-sized  monetary  pur- 
chases? By  their  exports,  of  course,  aa 
our  contributor  indicates.  But  with  all 
the  exports  that  we  can  send  abroad 
now,  we  can  already  buy  all  the  silver 
that  anyone  wants  for  69  cents  per 
ounce.  Mr.  Bland  alleges  that  paying 
twice  as  much  for  it,  or  getting  half  as 
much  in  return  for  our  exports,  will 
confer  abundant  prosperity  on  the  Na- 
tion! 

This  is  alleged  to  be  statesmanship 
in  this  year  of  grace.  It  is  of  the  class 
entirely  in  harmony  with  the  fiat  theor- 
ies, since  the  only  approach  to  states- 
manship about  it,  is  the  assertion  that 
it  is  so. 

The  fact  is,  as  should  be  known  by 
every  man  of  intelligence  enough  to 
master  the  rudiments  of  this  question, 
the  United  States  mints  will  not,  under 
free  coinage,  give  anything  at  all  for 
silver.  They  will  simply  take  the  sil- 
ver presented,  and  stamp  it  into  dollars 
showing  that  it  contains  a  certain  de- 
gree of  weight  and  fineness.  The  dol- 
lars that  the  owner  gets  back  will  be 
worth  just  what  is  costs  to  get  the 
silver  to  make  them.  They  can 
be  worth  no  more  than  that,  be- 


cause anyone  else  can  get  the  silver  and 
have  the  dollars  made  at  the  same 
price.  Yet  the  amazing  fact  is  that  one 
of  the  men  supposed  to  be  such  a  mas- 
ter of  the  question  that  he  was  the  sec- 
ond figure  in  the  contest  for  the  free 
silver  Presidential  nomination,  has 
put  himself  before  the  country  in  the 
attitude  of  claiming  that  the  United 
States  mints  will  buy  the  silver  of  the 
world,  to  such  a  degree  as  to  raise  the 
vast  stock  of  India  and  China  from  the 
present  price  of  69  cents  per  ounce  to 
$1.29.  .  :  ;  IH  lij 

Besides  the  fact  that 'the  free  silver 
disputants  have  been  unable  to  find 
any  answer  to  the  world-wide  facts,  and 
the  declarations  of  such  eminent  bi- 
metallists  as  Cernuschi  and  Otto 
Arendt,  our  point  is  demonstrated  by 
the  course  taken  in  their  argu- 
ments, that  prices  have  undergone  a 
ruinous  decline  by  reason  of  the  ad- 
vance in  the  purchasing  power  of  gold; 
that  therefore  debtors  are  oppressed; 
and  the  conclusion  as  to  the  public  duty 
that  free  coinage  must  be  adopted  in 
order  that  the  debtor  may  pay  his  debt 
in  dollars  more  easily  obtained  through 
the  advance  in  prices,  that  would  fol- 
low a  cheapened  dollar.  If  they 
were  amenable  to  logic  they  would  see 
that  the  attitude  they  have  now  reached 
proves  that  their  first  position  ""was 
either  insincere,  or  ignorant.  Mr. 

K 's  familiar  denunciations  of  the 

decline  in  prices,  the  advance  in  gold 
by  100  per  cent,  and  the  necessity  of 
relieving  these  hardships,  have  no 
meaning  at  all,  unless  the  free  coinage 
should  cheapen  the  dollar.  If  it  raised 
silver  to  a  parity  with  gold,  it  would 
be  just  as  hard  for  the  debtor  to  pay 
debts  in  silver  as  in  gold,  and  would 
not  relieve  the  hardship  of  50-cent 
wheat  in  the  slightest  degree.  We  be- 
lieve Mr.  K to  have  reached  his 

genuine  position;  but  he  does  so  at  the 
exprnse  of  showing  that  his  original 
position  was  the  false  one. 

Exactly  the  same  thing  is  true  of  the 
other  leading  free  silver  contributor, 
"Bimetallist."  He  comes  along  in  more 
consecutive  and  orderly  style;  but  he 


25 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


reaches  the  same  point.  The  man  who 
could  once  pay  $1,000  of  debt  with  1,000 
bushels  of  wheat  must  now  pay  2,000 
bushels  to  discharge  the  same  debt.  The 
desire  is  that  the  payment  shall  be 
maae  in  silver  in  order  that  the  thous- 
and bushels  of  wheat  shall  be  again 
able  to  pay  the  thousand  dollars,  me 
same  assertions  are  maae  of  doubling 
the  price  of  gold,  of  doubling  debt  witn 
it,  and  ot  the  need  of  adopting  the  sil- 
ver standard  to  enable  the  payment  of 
one-half  the  present  debt.  This  is  the 
reai  issue;  and  reduces  all  that  has 
ueen  wriuen  by  our  correspondent  to 
prove  tnat  free  coinage  would  not  de- 
preciate the  standard,  to  tne  argument- 
ative value  of  waste  paper,  For  if  free 
coinage  would  raise  the  silver  dollar 
to  the  parity  ot  gold,  it  would  leave 
things  just  as  they  are.  The  farmer 
must  raise  just  as  mucn  wheat  to  earn 
tne  thousand  dollars  or  sliver  or  pay  a 
iiiousana  dollars  or  debt.  The  mortgage 
will  be  just  as  nearly  a  deed  as  before, 
and  the  same  amount  of  eiiort  to  get  a 
aollar  will  be  required,  'i'ne  purpose 
tiiat  our  correspondent  avows  of  re- 
lieving the  debtor  by  a  cheaper  dollar 
is  entirely  defeated  if  free  coinage  does 
^not  cheapen  the  dollar;  which  makes 
his  previous  argument  that  the  dollar 
will  not  be  cheapened,  an  empty  and 
insincere  parade  of  words. 

It  is  undoubtedly  true,  that  in  reach- 
ing this  position,  our  free  silver  contrib- 
utors have  reached  their  genuine  pur- 
pose. This  is  corroborated  by  the  fact 
that  every  free  silver  leader,  whether 
Democratic  candidate  or  member  of  the 
Senatorial  silver  syndicate,  unites  in 
ha:-ping  on  the  decline  in  prices,  the 
burden  of  debts,  and  the  duty  of  legisla- 
tion to  rectify  these  hardships.  But 
n'ot  a  word  of  this  has  any  point  unless 
free  coinage  is  to  raise  prices  by  the 
device  of  calling  the  present  value  of 
a  half-dollar  a  dollar,  and  thus  furnish- 
ing a  cheaper  dollar  with  which  the 
debtoi  can  pay  his  debts  in  a  standard 
a  little  more  than  half  of  that  which 
is  now  established. 

We  are  entirely  willing  to  proceed 
to  the  discussion  of  prices,  debts  and 


the  effect  of  free  coinage  upom  them. 
But  this  must  be  upon  the  distinct  rec- 
ognition that,  in  shifting  to  that  point, 
tne  tree  silver  advocates  concede  that 
their  first  position  was  untenable.  By 
resorting  to  arguments  that  positively 
call  for  a  lowered  standard,  they  admic 
not  only  that  free  coinage  oy  the  United 
states  alone  will  not  raise  silver  to  a 
parity  witn  gold,  but  that  they  do  not 
wish  it  raised.  Before  passing  to  tne 
other  branch  of  the  question,  therefore, 
it  must  be  set  down  as  practically 
agreed: 

First — Free  coinage  by  the  United 
States  alone,  would  reduce  the  value  of 
tne  silver  dollar  to  the  market  value 
01  the  silver  bullion  in  it.  That  market 
value  is  now  the  equivalent  of  53  cents 
on  the  present  dollar;  but  as  the  United 
States  could  use  somewhat  more  silver 
than  at  present  it  might  raise  the  value 
of  the  standard  to  60  or  65  cents. 

Second — This  will  not  be  bimetallism, 
but  silver  monometallism,  as  no  man 
having  a  thousand  dollars  in  gold  will 
pay  it  in  trade  when  he  can  get  for  it 
$1,500  to  $1,600  in  the  coin  available  for 
payments. 

Third— This  will  not  Increase  our 
stock  of  money,  but  will  diminish  it 
by  taking  oat  of  circulation  all  our 
gold,  amounting  to  six  hundred  and 
twenty-five  millioua,  and  depreciat- 
ing tne  power  of  th«  remaining 
i,*00  millions  to  transact  the  oper- 
ations of  trade  in  exact  proportion 
as  tne  dollar  Is  cheapened. 

*     *     * 
VJI.-Gold   and    Prices. 

We  have  now  reached  the  point 
wnere  we  can  examine  the  claim  of  the 
free  coinage  advocates,  that  their  meas- 
ure should  be  adopted  in  order  to  re- 
lieve the  producer  by  raising  prices  and 
the  debtor  by  making  it  easier  to  get 
money  to  pay  debts,  with  a  clear  under- 
standing that  this  implies  the  reduc- 
tion of  the  monetary  standard  to  the 
bullion  value  of  the  silver  dollar.  A 
statement  of  their  reasons  for  doing 
this,  is  the  first  step  to  an  intelligent 
discussion  of  the  proposition.  In  addi- 
tion to  the  assertion  of  a  crime  and  con- 


26 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


spiracy  against  silver  in  1873,  whichx 
has  been  heretofore  shown  to  be  a  base- 
less imagination,  they  allege: 

First— That  under  the  legislation  of 
1873  and  subsequent  years,  gold  has  en- 
hanced in  value  100  per  cent,  as  com- 
pared with  all  other  commodities,  while 
the  value  of  production  has  declined  in 
equal  ratio,  the  necessary  result  being 
that  "securities,"  by  which  is  meant 
bonds,  mortgages,  and  other  debts,  pay- 
able in  money,  have  increased  in  equal 
proportion  to  the  purchasing  power  of 
gold. 

Second— That  as  the  result  of  this 
the  debts  have  eaten  up  the  production, 
the  country  has  been  unprosperous,  and 
the  burden  of  debt  has  immensely  in- 
creased in  volume.  One  statement  of  it 
is  that  there  was  practically  no  debt 
in  this  country  in  1870,  and  that  there 
is  $28,000,000,000  now. 

Third — That  the  reduction  in  prices 
caused  by  the  conspiracy  of  1873  is  even 
and  equal  with  the  reduction  in  the 
\  price  of  silver,  one  way  of  putting  it 
being  that  frequently  heard,  "Since  the 
silver  bullion  will  buy  as  much,"  as  it 
ever  did. 

Fourth — As  a  deduction  from  these 
various  allegations,  it  Is  plainly  the 
right  thing,  and  the  only  right  thing, 
for  the  United  States  to  do,  to  adopt 
free  silver  coinage,  for  the  express  pur- 
pose that  we  may  have  a  cheaper  dol- 
lar, that  by  reason  of  that  cheaper  dol- 
lar, prices  may  advance,  and  especially 
that  prices  having  advanced,  or  the 
standard  being  cheapened,  the  debtors 
of  to-day  may  be  able  to  pay  their 
creditors  less  than  they  would  pay  them 
by  the  present  standard. 

If  there  are  other  leading  points  in 
this  stock  argument  for  the  cheaper 
dollar,  we  will  add  them  when  called 
upon  to  do  so.  But  without  claiming 
absolute  exhaustiveness,  we  think  it  is 
a  fair  outline  of  the  doctrine. 

Apart  from  the  question  whether  it 
is  a  correct  conclusion  to  disturb  the 
standard  now,  because  it  is  alleged  to 
have  been  disturbed  26  years  ago,  and 
without  reference  to  the  future  results 
of  such  a  step— all  of  which  The  Dis- 


patch will  take  up  in  due  time — there 
is  a  wide  range  of  assertion  here,  that, 
in  order  to  carry  out  our  purpose  of 
exact  and  accurate  determination  of 
each  point,  must  be  submitted  to  the 
test  of  facts.  To  do  that  properly  it 
may  be  necessary  to  devote  an  article 
or  more  to  each  of  the  assertions. 

Before  taking  up  the  question  of  the 
advance  in  the  purchasing  power  of 
gold,  we  will  give  a  paragraph  to  the 
corelated  assertion,  made  by  the  free 
silver  advocates,  that  the  gold  is  in 
possession  of  a  few  persons  who  have 
got  it  permanently  "tied  up."  It  is  an 
insult  to  the  public  intelligence  that 
anyone  should  make  such  an  allegation 
in  the  light  of  the  events  of  the  past  six 
months.  For,  within  the  present  year, 
there  was  a  case  in  which  the  strongest 
monetary  combination  of  this  country 
mado  a  transient  attempt  of  that  sort. 
It  could  realize  a  profit  of  several  mil- 
lions if  it  could  control  the  stock  of  gold 
not  for  the  impossible  and  unprofitable 
period  of  over  20  years,  but  for  the 
space  of  one  month.  A  temporary  be- 
lief in  its  fictitious  control  was  im- 
posed on  the  Treasury  management; 
but  when,  in  obedience  to  the  public 
demand,  the  bond  issue  was  thrown 
open  to  competitive  bidding,  the  gold 
of  the  country  competed  for  the  bonds 
to  the  extent  of  about  $600,000,000.  With 
that  demonstration  of  the  failure  of  an 
attempt  to  control  the  gold  for  30  days 
•  fresh  in  the  public  mind,  the  talk  of 
coi  trolling  the  stock  of  the  world  for 
over  two  decades  is  the  emptiest  non- 
sense. 

The  Disoatch  has  heretofore  stated 
its  belief  that  there  has  been  since  1873 
some  appreciation  in  the  purchasing 
power  of  gold.  Exactly  what  that  ap- 
preciation has  been,  is  difficult  to  de- 
termine; but  that  it  is  nothing 
like  what  is  alleged  by  our  free  silver 
friends  is  not  at  all  difficult  to  demon- 
strate. They  base  their  assertion  that 
gold  has  increased  in  value  100  per  cent 
upor  a  comparison  of  it  with  certain 
staples  in  which  there  has  been  a 
marked  decline.  In  every  one  of  these 
cases  the  decline  is  mainly  and  notor- 


27 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


iously  due  to  causes  entirely  separate 
from  the  monetary  standard.  Wheat  is 
the  favorite  example,  and  even  with 
regard  to  that  staple  constituting  less 
than  2  per  cent  of  the  total  production 
of  the  country,  their  assertions  suffer 
a  severe  shrinkage  when  compared  with 
actual  facts. 

"Was  not  wheat  worth  a  dollar?"  de- 
mands our  typical  silverite.      Was  it? 
We  have  before  us  a  statement  of  the 
amount  of  leading  agricultural  products 
and  prices,  in  various  States,  in  1869, 
furnished  by  the  Census  of  1870.    It  was 
collected  and  published  before  anyone 
dreamed  of     a  silver  question.       The 
wheat  crop  was  one  of  246,000,000  bush- 
els, or  the  proportionate  equivalent  of  a 
400,000,000  bushel  crop  at  present.    The 
price  of  wheat  per  bushel  in  the  trans- 
Mississippi  region,  as  it  was  then  de- 
veloped, was:    Iowa,  52  cents;  Kansas, 
79  cents;  Nebraska,  57  cents;  Minnesota, 
59  cents.    In  the  same  table  as  we  come 
east  we  find  the  price  rising,  in  Illinois, 
Indiana,  Michigan  and  Ohio  to  76  up  to 
97  cents,  while  east  of  Ohio,  in  Pennsyl- 
vania and  New  York,  it  was  $1.28@1.34 
per  bushel.     Does  not  this  suggest  to 
any  fair  mind  one  leading  cause  of  the 
decline  in  wheat?    In  the  region  which 
now  affects  by  its  output  the  wheat 
market  of  this  country,  there  was  no 
dollar  wheat  in  1869.    Fifty  to  60-cent 
wheat  was  established  then,  or  in  gold 
value,  to  compare  it  with  gold  value 
now,  40  to  48-cent  wheat.    The  use  of 
harvesters,  steam  ploughs,  the  meth- 
ods of  bonanza  farms,  and  the  opening 
of  immense  wheat  districts  in  other 
parts  of  the  world,  have'  still  further 
reduced  the  price  obtained  for  wheat 
in  the  West;  but  when  the  fact  set  forth 
above  is  taken  into  consideration,  not 
so  much  as  was  supposed.    The  margin 
left  for  the  influence  produced  by  an 
advance  in  gold,  would,  if  wheat  alone 
were  to  be  taken  as  the  criterion,  re- 
duce that  appreciation  to  an  infinitesi- 
mal percentage. 

The  same  mistake  extends  through 
the  whole  list  of  staples  usually  cited, 
such  as  the  other  cereals,  iron,  steel, 
wool,  cotton  and  many  others,  including 


silver,  for  all  of  which  either  improved 
processes  or  the  immense  enlargement 
of  production,  or  both  together,  have 
been  leading  features  of  industrial  his- 
tory. We  can  only  judge  of  the  value 
of  gold,  while  it  is  the  standard,  by  its 
purchasing  power.  But  to  obtain  any 
approximation  to  correctness  we  must 
make  the  comparison  on  staples  in 
which  there  have  been  no  revolutionary 
inventions  and  no  vast  multiplication 
of  production  in  proportion  to  original 
demand.  To  do  this  exhaustively  is 
the  statistical  labor  of  years.  Some  of 
those  who  carried  it  furthest  present 
showings  that  the  average  of  all  suet 
products  measured  by  a  given  amount 
of  gold  is  less  now  than  25  years  ago — 
a  conclusion  that  we  are  not  prepared  to 
fully  accept. 

But  it  is  certain  that  there  are  a  great 
many  evidences  in  that  field  that  the 
decline  of  values  solely  by  the  enhance- 
ment of  the  standard  has  been  nothing 
at  all  approximating  the  allegations  of 
our  free  silver  friends.    In  agriculture, 
which  is  frequently  appealed  to,  such 
facts  are  prominent  and  decisive.    The 
corn  and  hog  products  of  the  country 
were  worth  over  $1,000,000,000  in  1891, 
against  $800,000,000  as  the  maximum 
value  of  the  crops  of  wheat  and  cotton 
taken  together;  and  after  20  years  the 
prices  of  both  taken  together  are  higher 
than  they  were  in  1873.     Poultry  and 
eggs  form  a  staple  in  which  there  have 
been  some  improved  methods,  but  not 
enough  to  cause  a  huge  expansion  of 
product  with  the  same  amount  of  labor, 
and  the  consequence  is  that  eggs  and 
poultry  are  worth  nearly  as  much  as 
they  were  in  1870.    Butter,  though  the 
creamery  methods  might  be  expected 
to  largely  increase  the  supply,  and  oleo- 
margarine is  supposed  to  be  another 
depressing  factor,     has   declined  less 
than   5   per   cent.     The   total  produc- 
tion of  hay  on  all  farms  is  greater  than 
the  value  of  any  cereal,  except  corn, 
and,  notwithstanding  the  mowing  ma 
chine,  hay  is  worth  more  to-day  than 
its  gold  value  in  either  1869  or  1860. 
These   instances  might  be   multiplied 
without  reaching  a  conclusion  until  all 


28 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


the  price  lists  of  the  world,  all  the 
factors  of  prices  throughout  the  world, 
were  examined.  But  there  is  one  staple, 
the  largest  in  total  amount,  the  most 
important  to  the  masses.  The  cost  of 
living  for  labor  has  been  materially  re- 
duced; yet  the  following  figures  come 
from  the  census  reports  of  1870  and  1890 
wjth  regard  to  manufactures: 

1870  1890 
Number  of  es- 
tablishments.      252,448  355,415 
Number  of  em- 
ployes          2,053,996           4,712,622 

Wages  paid... $775,584,343  $2,253,216,529 
Av.  annual 

wages  ....  $382  $484 

To  make  the  comparison  exact,  we 
must  remember  that  the  figures  for 
1870  are  expressed  in  depreciated  cur- 
rency, and  that  the  gold  value  of  wages 
given  in  that  column  is  $306.  If,  there- 
fore, it  is  a  fact  that  gold  has  appreciat- 
ed 100  per  cent  since  1873  the  indus- 
trial wage-workers  of  the  United 
States  received  in  1890  over  three 
times  the  wages  of  1870.  We  do  not 
think  the  record  is  so  good  as  that;  but 
it  is  good  enough,  however  it  is  taken. 
It  would  be  foolish  to  claim  that  this 
rise  in  the  actual  amount  of  wages  paid 
is  due  to  the  gold  standard.  It  is  due  to 
the  immense  expansion  of  industry  un- 
der a  variety  of  causes,  of  which  the 
stability  and  assurance  of  our  financial 
system  are  an  important  part.  But 
the  fact  that  such  an  expansion  has 
taken  place,  and  that  the  manufactur- 
ers of  the  United  States  have  been  able 
to  employ  2,650,000  more  men,  to  pay 
them  $1,500,000  more  wages,  and  to  in- 
crease the  wages  paid  each  employe  by 
not  less  than  60,  and  probably  75  or  80 
per  cent,  is  a  crushing  answer  to  the 
wild  allegations  of  the  ruin  and  deso- 
lation caused  by  the  alleged  advance 
in  the  value  of  gold. 

While  these  facts  utterly  upset  the 
fictitious  statements  with  regard  to  100 
per  cent  advance  in  gold,  the  statement 
of  the  precise  change  in  the  purchasing 
power  of  gold  is  not  so  easy.  The 
wages  of  labor  just  cited  would,  if  ac- 
cepted as  a  measure,  show  a  marked 


decline  in  the  purchasing  power  of  gold; 
but,  as  already  said,  it  is  not  a  correct 
measure,  the  advance  in  wages  being 
largely  due  to  other  factors,  such  as 
the  enlarged  use  of  machinery,  which 
multiplies  the  productive  power  of  la- 
bor. But  there  is  another  measure  as 
universal  as  wages  which  has  been  sub- 
jected to  no  such  revolutionary  chang- 
es in  cost  of  creation  as  steel  ^,nd  iron, 
and,  while  the  amount  in  competition 
has  largely  increased,  it  has  not  been 
such  an  immensely  depressing  factor  as 
the  multiplication  of  wheat  lands  all 
over  the  world.  Yet  it  is  that  very  de- 
partment of  industry  which  is  alleged 
to  be  depressed  one-half  by  the  con- 
spiracy of  1873. 

Thr  total  of  improved  acres  in  the 
farms  of  the  United  States  by  the 'cen- 
sus of  1870  was  188,000,000,  and  by  the 
census  o'f  1890  it  was  357,000,000,  an  in- 
crease of  about  90  per  cent.  The  gold 
value  of  farm  land,  fences  and  build- 
ings, in  1870,  was  $7,410,000,000;  in  1890, 
it  was  $13,297,000,000.  Thus  we  have  an 
average  value  per  acre  in  1870  of  $39.23, 
and  in  1890  of  $37.22  per  acre.  As  al- 
ready pointed  out,  there  were  some 
special  causes  inducing  a  decline.  The 
productive  acreage  increased  nearly  90 
per  cent,  while  the  population  of  the 
country  increased  but  63  per  cent.  The 
169,000,000  of  new  acreage  was  practic- 
ally all  from  the  States  which  in  1869 
produced  wheat  and  rye  at  50  to  60  cents 
per  bushel,  oats  at  30  to  40  cents,  and 
corn  at  20  to  30  cents,  or  from  newer 
States  with  even  greater  powers  of 
cheaper  production.  This  addition  of 
new  and  cheap  land  to  the  total  would 
inevitably  lower  the  average  price  per 
acre,  other  things  being  equal.  Yet  the 
actual  fact  is  that  notwithstanding  this 
influence,  the  decrease  in  the  acreage 
value  of  improved  lands  was  just  about 
5  per  cent,  up  to  1890. 

The  comparison  of  tables  of  values,  to 
indicate  the  purchasing  power  of  the 
monetary  standard,  is  subject  to  the 
objection  that  they  do  not  exclude  the 
reduction  in  cost  caused  by  improve- 
ments in  production  and  transporta- 
tion, or  the  rise  induced  by  special 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


causes.  But  even  allowing  that  factor 
to  stay  in,  the  result  is  very  different 
from  that  which  our  free  silver  friends 
allege.  Soetbeer's  tables  took  the  price 
of  114  staples  at  Hamburg,  and  there- 
fore covered  the  widest  field,  giving  the 
most  valuable  results.  The  values 
from  1847  to  1850  were  taken  as  100, 
with  th§  following  evidence  of  the 
changes  in  gold  values  since  then: 

1851-55 112.22 

1856-60 120.91 

1866-70 123.59 

1873* 138. 

188G-90 104.49 

This  shows  that  the  reduction  in  the 
purchasing  value  of  gold  from  1850  to 
1870  raised  the  average  price  of  staples 
a  maximum  of  23%  per  cent.  We  in- 
sert the  figures  for  a  still  higher  rise  in 
prices,  which  was  especially  evident  in 
Hamburg,  and  was  also  felt  all  over 
the  world,  from  1871  to  1874,  due  to  the 
Franco-German  war.  That  it  had  noth- 
ing to  do  with  the  relations  of  gold  to 
silver,  we  think  our  silver  friends  will 
admit,  when  they  see  that  it  took  place 
after  the  German  decree  adopting  gold 
coinage  and  during  the  same  period  that 
silver  was  falling  from  $1.31  per  ounce 
to  $1.26.  Then  the  average  of  prices  de- 
clined, slowly,  reaching  the  level  of  1866 
to  1870  about  1878,  and  reducing  the 
general  level  in  the  years  1886-90  to 
104.49,  or  about  162-3  percent  below  the 
values  prior  to  1870.  That  these  tables 
include  such  staples  as  wheat,  or  wheat 
flour,  iron,  steel  and  petroleum,  which 
can  be  produced  and  marketed  now  at 
one-half  to  one-sixth  the  cost  of  human 
labor  required  to  produce  them  in  the 
seventies,  is  beyond  dispute.  There- 
fore, 16  2-8  per  cent  is  an  excessive 
statement  of  the  appreciation  in  gold. 

Tn  the  same  connection  some  figures 
on  the  leading  staples  in  the  commerce 
of  this  country  are  interesting.  A  tol- 
erably definite  showing  of  the  course  of 
prices  on  agricultural  products  is  af- 
forded by  v  the  following  table  of  prices 
in  New  York  of  the  leading  staples,  in 
which  new  inventions  and  improved 
methods  have  not  been  at  work.  Ex- 
cluding wheat,  oats,  rye  and  barley, 


iron,  steel,  cotton  and  woolen  goods, 
because,  as  already  shown,  their  prices 
have  been  reduced  by  well-known  caus- 
es outside  of  the  monetary  standard, 
the  figures  give  an  idea  as  to  the  real 
course  of  prices.  They  are  all  affected 
by  the  reduced  cost  of  transportation. 
The  commercial  authority  from  which 
we  take  these  figures  does  not  give 
prices  prior  to  1879,  giving  prices  only 
for  the  period  of  the  gold  basis.  The 
prices  for  1873  would  undoubtedly  be 
higher,  for  two  reasons.  First,  they 
were  quoted  in  depreciated  currency; 
second,  in  many  of  them  the  demand 
from  Europe,  which,  as  we  noted  in 
quoting  Soetbeer's  figures,  had  raised 
prices  at  Hamburg,  also  had  their  effect 
in  the  New  York  market.  The  quota- 
tions at  the  opening  of  the  years  speci- 
fied are  as  follows: 

1879.      1892.      1894.     1896. 
Corn,  bu...$    47     $      53     $      42     $    36 
Pork,  bbl..  705      1050      1425      975 
Lard,   lb..        5%     .     6%         8%       5% 
Hams,  lb..        6  7%         9%        814 

Butter,  lb.      23  26  25         22 ' 

Cheese,  lb.       8%       11%       11%     10 
Leather,  ".      19%       17  18         22 

Hay,  cwt..      45  65  80         85 

These  figures  prove  that  from  1879  to 
1894  the  values  of  these  important  sta- 
ples advanced  rather  than  declined.  In 
the  past  two  years,  with  some  excep- 
tions, they  have  declined.  The  immense 
corn  crop  of  last  year  is  a  prominent 
cause  of  the  decline  in  that  staple,  and 
the  pork  products;  the  depression  of 
1893-4  also  had  its  general  effect.  But 
the  proof  of  the  general  maintenance  of 
these  prices  during  the  period  in  which 
silver  declined  from  1.14  to  68c  per 
ounce,  is  complete  disproof  of  the  claim 
that  all  products  have  declined  in  the 
same  proportion,  and  that,  therefore, 
gold  has  appreciated  in  the  same  ratio. 

For  the  sake  of  obtaining  a  more  ex- 
tended comparison  of  the  course  of 
prices  in  this  country,  with  that  indi- 
cated by  Soetbeer  for  Europe,  we  have 
taken  from  the  United  States  Statisti- 
cal Abstract  for  1896,  the  quotations  for 
the  period  1872  to  1874  inclusive,  and 
compared  them  with  the  quotations  of 


30 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


Iho  three  years,  1890-2,  and  the  three 
y<  i'.rs,  1893-5.  Twenty-nine  staples  in 
the  following  list  are  thus  compared, 
the  average  price  for  the  years  1872-4 
being  reduced  to  gold  value.  Nine  more 
are  included,  for  which  the  values 
given  by  the  United  States  Statistical 
Abstract  do  not  go  back  further  than 
18"7D7these  being  indicated  by  asterisks. 
Tne  prices  of  grain  and  farm  animals 
are  those  afforded  by  the  statistical  val- 
uation of  the  crops  for  the  years  speci- 
fied in  the  fields  of  production.  Other 
prices  are  those  in  the  New  York  mar- 
ket. The  table  is  as  follows: 


1872-4 

1890-2 

1893-5 

Wheat. 

$  1  047 

$  0  76  7 

$  0  51  3 

Rye 

69  6 

55  7 

48  5 

Oats 

35. 

352 

27  2 

Cotton  
Standard  Prints..  .  . 
Ohio  Wools  

17.5 
9.6 
52. 

9.1 
6.1 

30. 

7.6 
23! 

Carpet  Wools*  
Pig  Iron  
Illuminating  Oils.  . 
Copper*  
Tin  Plates  
Corn. 

13. 
35  54. 
21.6 
13.6 
4.5 
41  8 

10. 
17  56. 
6.7 
7.9 
3. 
432 

9. 
1342. 
4.6 
8.2 
2.6 
36  2 

Tallow*  

6.38 

4.67 

4  86 

Rio  Coffee*  

14.9 

16.2 

16.5 

Sugar  (Raw)*  
Anthracite  Coal.. 
Leather  
Bacon  and  Hams. 
Lard 

7.4 

4  57. 
21.6 

8.4 
98 

4.3 
3  91. 
16.1 

7.8 
7 

3.4 
3  76. 
15.1 
9.1 

8  7 

Salt  Pork  
Mess  Pork  
Salt  Beef 

7.5 
14  11. 
6.9 

6. 
11  67. 
5.6 

7.6 
14  79. 
5  6 

Butter  

Eggs 

18.1 
21.1 

14.9 
17. 

17.6 
199 

Cheese  

11.3 

9.1 

9.4 

Tobacco.  ..  .. 

8.7 

8.6 

87 

Flax  (per  ton)*.... 
Hemp*  .  .  . 

307  00. 
113  00. 

251  00. 
160  00. 

290  Ou. 
138  00. 

India  Rubber**..... 
Mackerel*  
Rice 

48.9 
5  39. 
3.2 

44. 
11  97. 
2 

44. 

11  06. 
17 

Still  Wines  
Horses.  . 

67.5. 
65  10. 

69. 
65  50 

70.2 
39  40 

Mules  
Milch  Cows  
Beef  Cattle  
Sheep 

81  90. 
26  25. 
17  15. 
2  45. 

85  50. 
21  90. 
15  00. 
2  45 

57  08. 
20  60. 
14  90. 
2  00 

Swine  

369. 

4  50. 

5  46. 

In  these  prices  can  be  seen  the  pert- 
ineDce  of  Prof.  Taussig's  warning 
against  accepting  such  tables  as  the 
basis  of  exact  conclusions  on  the  pur- 
chasing power  of  money,  in  the  marked 
changes  due  to  special  and  well-known 
causes.  Thus  horses  retained  their  val- 
ue in  gold  for  eighteen  years,  but  when 
electric  railways  and  bicycles  made 
themselves  felt,  declined  nearly  one- 
half.  Sheep  were  worth  as  much  in 
1890-2  as  in  1872-4,  but  the  repeal  of 


the  wool  tariff  caused  a  heavy  deprecia- 
tion. The  doubling  of  the  value  of  mess 
mackerel  is  plainly  due  to  a  special 
cause,  but  not  more  so  than  the  de- 
cline of  one-half  in  the  price  of  wheat. 
The  results  to  be  drawn  from  these 
figures  are  not  to  be  accepted  as  a  pre- 
cise determination  of  the  price  of  gold; 
but  taken  in  connection  with  the  figures 
already  cited,  they  permit  approximate 
conclusions. 

First,  separating  the  staples  that 
have  declined,  from  prominent  and 
noted  causes,  such  as  the  improved  har- 
vesters, opening  of  new  fields  of  pro- 
duction, and  new  routes  of  commerce 
for  those  of  which  iranspor cauoa  was 
the  chief  element  of  cost  in  New  York  and 
new  processes  of  manufacture,  we  have 
the  following  result.  Taking  the  gold 
prices  of  1872-4  as  100,  the  prices  on 
these  staples  subjected  to  special  in- 
fluences of  decline  show  for  the  periods 
named  the  following  percentage  of  the 
former  prices: 

1890-2.  1893-5. 

Wheat  73          49 

Rye  80  70 

Oats 100  78 

Cotton   52  43 

Standard  prints (53  53 

Ohio  wools f>8  45 

Carpet  wools 77          oy 

Pig  iron 4y          38 

Illuminating  oils 31  21 

Copper 58  GO 

Tin  plates 67  58 

Sugar  58  40 

Rice  G^  53 

Average 64          52 

From  the  remaining  25  staples  we  ex- 
clude mess  mackerel,  in  which  the  120 
per  cent  advance  is  clearly  outside  of 
any  monetary  influence.  We  also  ex- 
clude lard  and  salt  pork  as  of  tne  same 
class  as  bacon  and  mess  pork.  '10  tne  re- 
maming  24  we  add  two  great  staples 
already  referred  to,  and  of  more  value 
in  determining  the  course  of  prices, 
than  any  commercial  commodity.  In 
this  list,  which  may  be  held  as  showing 
the  normal  course  of  prices,  the  per- 


31 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


centage  of  the  prices  of  1872-4,  for  the 
periods  indicated  is  as  follows: 

1890-2.  1893-5. 

Corn  104  87 

Mess  pork 83  105 

Tallow 73  76 

Rio  coffee 108  110 

Anthracite  coal 88  82 

Leather 75  70 

Bacon  and  hams 93  108 

Salt  beef 81  81 

Buttei    83  97 

Eggs 81  94 

Cheese  81  8* 

Tobacco 99  100 

Flax   82  94 

Hemp 142  122 

India  rubber 90  90 

Still  wines 102  105 

Horses  101  60 

Mules 104  70 

Milch  cows 83  75 

Beef  cattle 88  87 

Sheep  100  81 

Swine 122  121 

Average 89          90 

Improved  farm  lands...  95 
Industrial  wages loo 

Average 92 

The  percentages  of  the  last  two  items 
are  from  the  comparison  of  the  years 
18U9  and  1879  given  in  the  census.  With 
them  the  average  fall  in  values  on  sta- 
ples not  affected  by  important  and 
special  causes  is  8  per  cent.  Without 
them  it  is  11  per  cent,  in  18  years,  and 
10  per  cent  in  21  years.  The  six  staples 
on  which  the  comparison  only  begins 
at  1879,  might  make  the  average  de- 
cline one  per  cent  greater. 

There  are  further  inferences  from 
these  figures  that  are  important  in  this 
connection.  The  13  staples  subjected 
to  the  influences  of  impro  ved  machinery 
and  multiplied  fields  of  production, 
show  by  themselves  an  average  decline 
of  36  per  cent  for  the  years  1690-2,  and 
of  48  per  cent  for  the  years  1893-5.  But 
taking  them  with  the  others,  the  aver- 
age ratio  on  the  36  staples,  including 
the  one  excluded  from  the  other  table 
on  account  of  its  exceptional  advance, 


is  84  per  cent  at  the  earlier  period,  and 
79  per  cent  in  the  later  one.  The  first 
results  correspond  closely  with  the  de- 
cline in  prices  shown  by  Soetbeer's 
tables  of  16  per  cent  between  1870  and 
1890,  and  indicates  that  if  staples  sub- 
jected to  special  causes  of  reduction  of 
price  had  been  excluded  from  the  Ger- 
man statistician's  figures,  the  result 
would  have  shown,  like  ours,  a  general 
decline,  outside  of  those  examples,  of  10 
to  11  per  cent.  The  second  result  con- 
tains another  important  suggestion. 
The  decline  on  the  36  staples  was  16 
per  cent  in  18  years,  and  5  per  cent 
more  in  the  next  three  years.  On  the 
13  staples  of  greatest  decline  it  was  36 
per  cent  in  18  years  and  12  per  cent 
more  in  three  years.  In  other  words, 
the  annual  rate  of  decline  was  just 
about  twice  as  great  during  three  years 
of  disturbed  credit  and  legislative  in- 
terference with  business,  as  during  the 
18  years  of  the  alleged  demonetization. 
These  facts,  with  others  that  might 
indefinitely  stretch  out  the  subject,  per- 
mit us  to  see  how  much  truth  there  is 
in  the  assertion  that  the  silver  dollar, 
the  bullion  value  of  it,  will  purchase  as 
much  as  ever.  In  1870  the  bullion  value 
of  a  thousand  silver  dollars  would  pay 
the  average  wages  of  the  industrial 
worker  for  three  years  and  nearly  four 
months;  in  1890  it  would  no%t  quite  pay 
the  average  wages  for  one  year  and  one 
month;  in  1870  it  would  pay  the  average 
price  of  25  acres  of  improved  farming 
land;  in  1890  it  would  buy  about  14 
acres.  It  would  buy  less  hay,  less  but- 
ter, less  eggs  and  poultry.  It  will  buy 
a  little  more  than  half  as  much  corn  and 
less  than  half  as  much  hogs  and  hog 
products.  Until  the  trolley  and  the  bi- 
cycle knocked  out  the  horse  it  would 
buy  less  horses.  It  is  really  doubtful 
whether  it  will  buy  as  much  wheat  on 
the  farms  of  Kansas,  Nebraska  and  the 
Dakctas  to-day  as  in  1870.  It  will  buy 
more  iron  and  steel,  because  invention 
has  enabled  from  four  to  six  tons  of 
these  staples  to  be  turned  out  at  the 
former  cost  of  one  ton.  Pursue  the  in- 
quiry through  the  entire  list  of  com- 


32 


A  SILVER  .SYMPOSIUM. 


modities  and  staples,  and  it  will  be 
found  that  the  bullion  value  of  silver 
will  not  purchase  as  much  as  it  did  in 
1870,  by  50  and  60  per  cent. 

The  causes  of  the  decline  in  silver  are 
well  known  to  anyone  who  has  sought 
the  information.  Of  the  47  per  cent  de- 
cline in  silver  from  the  parity  of  gold, 
20  to  25  per  cent  was  probably  caused 
bj  the  multiplied  production  from  the 
Comstock  lode,  the  carbonate  camps, 
Mexico  and  South  America;  from  15  to 
20  per  cent  from  the  cessation  of  de- 
mand by  the  European  countries  that 
changed  from  silver  to  gold,  and  by  the 
stocks  of  silver  which  they  gradually 
pressed  on  the  market,  and,  perhaps, 
not  more  than  5  per  cent,  probably 
about  10  per  cent,  and  possibly  as 
much  as  15  per  cent,  was  due  to  the  ap- 
preciation of  gold  from  the  demand  of 
countries  that  changed  from  silver  to 
gold,  or,  like  the  United  States,  resumed 
specie  payments  in  gold. 


VIII.— Wealth    and   Debt. 

The  article  on  "Gold  and  Prices"  in 
yesterday's  issue  dealt  with  the  allega- 
tion of  the  free  silver  men  that  gold 
had,  by  reason  of  demonetization, 
doubled  in  value.  In  this  article  we 
propose  to  give  some  attention  to  the 
correlated  assertion  that  this  increase 
has  been  destructive  of  prosperity,  has 
put  the  producers  of  the  country  "in 
a  hole,"  to  quote  one  elegant  expression 
of  our  controversialists. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  this  assertion 
of  fact  has  a  retroactive,  as  well  as  a  de- 
ductive, relation  to  the  allegation  of  an 
advance  in  gold.  If  the  monetary  stan- 
dard doubles  in  value,  it  must  be  a  se- 
vere burden  on  productive  industry, 
preventing  its  growth  and  expansion. 
Even  if  there  were  the  10  per  cent  ap- 
preciation of  the  gold  dollar,  which  we 
estimated  yesterday  as  the  probable 
change — and  Which  we  do  not  present 
as  a  precise  conclusion — it  would  be  a 
drawback.  If,  therefore,  industry  has 
been  stagnant,  the  creation  of  material 
wealth  at  a  standstill,  and  production 


limited  during  the  period  since  the  al- 
leged demonetization  of  silver,  it  would 
afford  corroborative  evidence  of  the  al- 
legation of  an  advance  in  gold  by  ex- 
hibiting the  symptoms  of  its  results.  If, 
on  the  contrary,  production  has  expand- 
ed, material  wealth  increased  not  only 
in  proportion  to  the  growth  of  popula- 
tion, but  in  excess  of  it;  wages  of  la- 
bor risen  and  the  total  of  products  mul- 
tiplied, the  conclusion  is  forced  upon  us 
not  only  that  the  100  per  cent  increase 
in  the  purchasing  power  of  gold  is  a 
figment  of  untaught  imagination,  but 
that  if  there  has  been  a  10  per  cent 
appreciation,  it  must  have  been  com- 
pensated for  by  some  other  factors  to 
offset  its  unfavorable  influence. 

The  question  which  we  propose  to 
take  up  to-day  is  the  existence  of  debt 
as  an  evidence  of  the  oppression,  ina- 
bility to  keep  the  teeming  millions  at 
work,  and  stoppage  of  production  of  na- 
tional wealth.  In  one  of  Mr.  K 's 

letters,  a  sentence  called  upon  us  to  re- 
fer to  the  census  of  1870  and  see"That 
the  debt  then  was  practically  nothing, 
and  then  to  go  to  the  census  of  1890, 
and  perceive  uiat  it  was  $28,000,000,000. 
Of  course  we  cannot  charge  the  ma- 
jority of  our  free  silver  friends  with 
supporting  this  absurdity,  although 
some  of  them  have  made  even  more  ex- 
travagant statements.  But  it  is  typ- 
ical— though  an  extreme  type — of  the 
general  claim  of  the  cheap  money 
school,  that  the  people  were  prosperous 
and  free  from  debt  before  the  crime  of 
1873,  and  that  they  have  been  loaded^ 
down  with  debt  by  its  results  in  the  suc- 
ceeding years. 

The  fact  is  that  the  census  of  1870,  so 
far  as  we  are  able  to  find  from  an  ex- 
amination of  it,  made  no  attempt  to 
give  a  statement  of  debts.  It  certainly 
made  no  such  idiotic  statement  as  that 
the  debt  was  "practically  nothing," 
and  if  it  had,  would  have  demonstrated 
thereby  its  utter  worthlessness.  But 
on  the  items  of  debt  in  which  the  census 
of  1870  permits  a  comparison  with  that 
of  1890,  the  following  is  the  result: 


33 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


Debta.                  1870.  1890. 

National  . .  .$2,406,562,372  $    891,960,104 

State    352,866,698  228,997,389 

County 187,565,540  145,048,045 

Municipal  . .      328,244,520  724,463,060 

School  dis 36,701,948 


Total   ....$3,275,239,130  $2,027,170,546 

In  other  words,  so  far  as  the  compari- 
son can  be  made  by  the  official  figures, 
to  which  we  were  cited,  the  result  is  a 
decrease  of  public  debt  by  over  one- 
third,  the  item  of  municipal  debts  being 
the  only  one  that  is  increased.  There 
are  other  items  of  debt  on  which  a  com- 
parison can  be  made,  not  by  authority 
of  the  census,  but  upon  other  fairly  re- 
liable sources,  as  follows: 

R.  R.  bonds.$l,580,000,000  $5,669,000,000 
Bank  loans..  1,300,000,000    3,077,000,000 


$2,880,000,000  $8,746,000,000 
Pub.   debt...  3,275,000,000    2,027,000,000 


Total   ....$6,155,000,000  10,773,000,000 

The  precise  figures  for  these  two 
items  in  1870  we  have  not  at  hand,  and 
we  quote  them  from  sources  which  give 
round  numbers.  They  may  be  liable  to 
slight  revision,  but  not  enough  to 
change  the  general  result.  Consequent- 
ly, we  have  a  net  increase  of  public, 
corporate  and  commercial  debts  from 
six  to  ten  billions. 

We  should  be  glad  to  have  our  free 
silver  friends  tell  us  what  volume  and 
page  of  the  census  of  1890  shows  a  total 
of  debts  of  $28,000,000,000,  as  alleged  by 
some  of  them.  At  the  time  of 
"Coin's"  remarkable  publication  of 
falsified  figures,  we  showed  that 
the  corrections  that  could  be 
made  by  any  man  of  average  intelli- 
gence would  reduce  his  statement  of 
$40,000,000,000  to  about  $18,000,000,000. 
This  is  closely  verified  by  the  volume 
of  the  United  States  Census  on  Mort- 
gage debt,  which  gives  the  following 
statement  of  the  amounts  of  debt  not 
included  in  the  statements  already 
made: 


Street  railway  debt $  182,240,754 

Telegraph,  electric  and 

other  corporations,  est.  143,335,567 

Telephone  Companies...  4,992,565 

Real  estate  mortgages. . .  6,019,679,985 
Crop  liens  and  chattel 

mortgages,  (est) . 600,000,000 

Private  debts  (est) 1,303,334,249 


Total    8,253,483,120 

Public   and   R.   R.   debt 
and  bank  loans 10,773,687,426 


Total  debt $19,027,170,546 

Of  the  $8,250,000,000  of  debt  stated 
above,  there  are  no  official  statistics 
given  for  1870,  with  which  to  compare 
the  figures.  It  is  evident  that  the  three 
hundred  millions  of  street  railway,  elec- 
tric, telephone  and  power  companies 
has  been  mainly  created  since  then, 
and  represent  a  large  addition  to  the 
wealth  of  the  nation.  But  no  sane  man 
will  claim  that  there  were  in  1870  no 
real  estate  mortgages,  crop  liens  or 
private  debts,  which  in  1890  made  up 
$7,900,000,000  of  the  total.  When  we 
remember  the  liquidation  of  those  debts 
that  took  place  from  1874  to  1878,  the 
fact  that  there  was  a  vast  total  of  them 
is  too  plain  for  dispute.  Conservatively 
estimating  these  debts  for  1870,  at 
$3,900,000,000,  or,  conceding  in  the 
mere  guess-work  that  must  result 
from  the  absence  of  statistics,  for  1870, 
that  this  unknown  factor  of  debt  has 
increased  more  rapidly  than  population, 
and  we  arrive  at  totals  of  about  10  bil- 
lions of  debt  for  1870,  against  19  bil- 
lions for  1890. 

While  we  were  referred  to  the  cen- 
sus as  authority  for  a  statement  which 
the  census  by  no  means  bears  out, 
there  is  one  thing  that  the  census  does 
show,  which  those  who  assert  its  enor- 
mous increase  of  debt  do  not  refer  to. 
That  is  the  return  of  the  total  wealth 
of  the  nation.  The  census  report  of  the 
total  wealth  for  1890  is  $65,073,000,000; 
for  1870  in  gold  value  it  is  $24,053,000,- 
000.  The  increase  is  $41,000,000,000. 
The  absolute  statistical  factors,  there- 
fore, show  that  public,  corporate  and 


34 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


commercial  debt  was  25  per  cent  of  the 
nation's  wealth  in  1870  and  16  per  cent 
in  1890.  Adding  a  liberal  estimate  of 
the  unknown  debt  for  1870  the  total 
was  over  40  per  cent  of  the  total  wealth, 
while  in  1890  it  was  29  per  cent.  The 
actual  meaning  of  the  increase  of  debt 
is  plain  in  the  character  of  the  items 
which  are  enlarged.  Public  debt  rep- 
resenting largely  tb»e  losses  of  the  war, 
has  been  decreased  more  than  $1,500,- 
000,000.  But  other  forms  have  been  in- 
creased enough  more  to  make  the  total 
expansion  $9,000,000,000,  by  which 
means  the  total  wealth  has  increased 
$40,000,000,000. 

This  may  give  some  light  on  the  ques- 
tion what  this  expansion  of  debt  was 
for.  The  largest  single  item  of  it,  and 
the  one  which  shows  the  largest  in- 
crease, is  that  of  $3,800,000,000  in  rail- 
road debt.  That  debt  furnished  the 
means  to  build  105,000  miles  of  rail- 
way, without  which  the  country  could 
never  have  expanded  as  it  has.  The 
increase  in  bank  loans  furnished  the 
means  for  a  corresponding  increase  in 
the  volume  of  mercantile  and  manufac- 
turing operations.  The  increase  in 
municipal  debt  stands  for  a  part  of  the 
expenditure  which  has  built  cities  and 
furnished  them  with  pavements,  sew- 
ers, water,  parks  and  public  buildings. 
The  increase  in  mortgage  debt  means 
the  construction  of  new  homes  in  cities 
and  the  opening  of  170,000,000  acres  of 
additional  farm  lands.  In  one  of  Mr. 
K 's  letters  he  said  "credit  (mean- 
ing debt)  is  putting  up  your  house  to 
get  money,"  which  is  a  sample  of  his 
characteristic  inaccuracy.  What  debt 
really  means  when  intelligence  and  in- 
dustry rule  it,  is  getting  money  to  put 
up  your  house.  A  man  has  a  lot  worth 
$1,000,  with  no  buildings  on  it,  and 
therefore  unproductive.  He  borrows 
$1,500  and  builds  a  house,  and  then  the 
rental  or  use  of  the  house  pays  him  an 
income  on  the  $2,500.  Is  the  man  better 
off  or  worse?  This  operation  expresses 
the  character  of  the  great  mass  of  debt. 

We  are  not  asserting  that  some  of  the 


debt  was  not  improvidently  contracted ; 
that  people  may  not  have  used  the  pro- 
ceeds of  loans  extravagantly,  or  that  in 
many  instances,  from  causes  outside  the 
question  of  the  standard,  it  is  not  a 
hard  struggle  to  pay  debts.  But  the 
fact  is,  nevertheless,  that  the  great 
mass  of  debt  over  which  such  an  .outcry 
is  raised,  was  the  means  of  the  Immense 
expansion  of  the  nation's  prosperity. 
Debt  that  is  contracted  to  carry  on  the 
ravages  of  war  stands  for  the  destruc- 
tion of  wealth;  debt  contracted  to  carry 
on  the  operations  of  industry  and  com- 
merce means  the  creation  of  wealth. 
The  operation  of  the  20  years  from  1870 
to  1890  was  to  decrease  the  debt  that 
represented  the  destruction  of  property 
and  to  Increase  that  which  has  been 
usod  for  the  creation  of  new  and  vast 
elements  of  production  in  agriculture, 
commerce  and  industry. 

Having  thus  shown  that  the  increase 
of  debt  in  this  country  does  not  in- 
dicate depression  or  inability  to  keep 
"the  teeming  millions  at  work,"  tb 
quote  from  a  controversialist,  but  ex- 
actly the  opposite,  we  will  give  a  par- 
agraph or  two  to  the  evidence  of  gen- 
eral growth  of  prosperity  apart  from 
that  topic.  We  referred  the  other  day 
to  the  multiplication  of  the  production 
of  iron  by  millions  where  there  were 
previously  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
tons;  of  steel  by  an  even  greater  factor; 
the  five  times  greater  value  of  manufac- 
tured products;  the  enlargement  of  ag- 
ricultural values  by  nearly  90  per  cent, 
and  other  evidences  of  the  same  char- 
acter. 

There  are  many  more  statistics  which 
might  be  cited  showing  the  gain  of 
wealth,  but  we  shall  be  content  for  this 
article  with  just  one  important  one. 
The  census  shows  the  wealth  of  the 
nation  per  capita  to  have  been  $780  in 
1870  and  $1,036  in  1890,  which  is  well 
enough  for  a  national  average.  But  it 
also  shows  the  following  changes  to 
have  taken  place  in  that  period  In  the 
States  which  make  the  loudest  com- 
plaints concerning  the  gold  standard: 


35 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


Wealth  Per  Capita. 

1870.      1890. 

The   Dakotas $395    $1,568 

Nebraska 563      1,205 

Kansas 518      1,261 

Iowa 601      1,196 

Minnesota 666      1,087 

Montana 737      3,427 

Wyoming 770      2,797 

Colorado 508      2,780 

Washington 566      2,177 

Oregon 567      1,882 

Idaho 437      2,464 

Nevada 733      3,941 

Utah.... 186      1,681 

Arizona 356      3,168 

New  Mexico 341      1,507 

This  shows  that  these  States  and  Ter- 
ritories in  every  case  obtained  an  in- 
crease of  wealth  in  proportion  to  pop- 
ulation much  above  the  average  in- 
crease. In  adaption  to  that,  while  ev- 
ery one  of  them  started  with  less  per 
capita  wealth  than  the  average,  they 
ended  with  much  more  than  the  aver- 
age, in  some  cases  over  three  times  as 
much. 

We  add  the  following  statement  con- 
eel  ning  the  exportation  of  the  two  lead- 
ing agricultural  staples,  stated  in  mil- 
lions of  dollars: 

Breadstuff  s.Provis. 

1870 70.5        31.3 

1871 77.6        39.3 

1872 82.0        53.2 

1873 96.0        82.0 

1874 ....156.9        82.4 

1890  I!.,'.. 154.9       136.2 

1891 128.1      139.0 

1892 299.3      140.3 

1893 200.3      138.4 

1894 166.7      145.2 

On  the  logic  of  post  hoc,  propter  hoc, 
to  which  our  free  silver  friends  are 
prone,  the  jump  in  exports  of  bread- 
stuffs  following  1873  might  be  urged 
as  a  proof  of  the  benefits  of  the  act. 
The  real  showing  of  the  figures  is  that 
the  increase  of  the  exports  of  these  two 
agricultural  staples,  from  a  volume  of 
about  $100,000,000  in  1870  to  $300,000,000 
in  the  past  five  years,  and  over  $400,- 
000,000  in  1892,  notwithstanding  the  de- 


cline in  most  of  the  export  values, 
proves  that  decline  to  be,  not  a  measure 
of  adversity,  but  an  index  of  prosperity. 
These  are  a  few  of  the  statistical 
facts  showing  that  the  second  claim  of 
the  cheap  money  men,  that  the  alleged 
appreciation  of  the  gold  standard  has 
palsied  industry  and  kept  the  millions 
standing  idle,  is  simply  the  product  of 
morbid  and  unregulated  imaginations. 
*  *  * 

IT.— Good   Times   and  Falling  Prices. 

In  our  silver  symposium  to-day  an 
evident  believer  in  cheap  money  asks 
two  questions  which  recall  the  famous 
conundrum  of  Charles  II.  His  poser  to 
the  men  of  science,  why,  if  a  vessel  is 
filled  entirely  full  of  water  and  a  fish 
put  into  it,  the  water  will  not  overflow, 
caused  a  great  deal  of  dissension  until 
some  practical  person  suggested  that 
the  water  might  overflow.  Our  corre- 
spondent's inquiries  are  a  good  deal  in 
that  category. 

Taking  his  second  question  first,  let 
us  inquire  whether  it  is  true  that  the 
gold  countries  have  no  attraction  for 
people  who  wish  to  better  themselves. 
The  gold  countries  are,  England, 
France,  Germany,  Austria,  Turkey, 
Egypt,  the  United  States,  Canada,  Aus- 
tralia and  South  Africa.  The  silver 
countries  are  Spain,  Mexico,  Central 
America  South  America,  India,  China 
and  Japan.  Russia  has  been  nominally 
silver,  but  really  irredeemable  paper, 
and  is  now  preparing .  to  redeem  in 
gold.  Italy  has  been  gold,  but  has  fall- 
en into  irredeemable  paper.  We  have 
no  hesitation  in  saying  that  the  list  of 
gold  countries  present  more  attractions 
for  labor  and  enterprise  than  the  list 
of  silver  countries. 

The  second  question  we  will  consider 
at  more  length,  because  it  involves  soms 
of  the  pivotal  principles  at  stake  in  the 
silver  issue.  First  as  to  the  question 
of  fact  whether  the  best  times  this 
country  ever  had  were  between  1865  and 
1872.  If  our  correspondent  will  ask*  any 
mr-n  from  the  Southern  States,  except- 
ing Maryland,  West  Virginia,  Ken- 


36 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


tucky  and  Missouri,  whose  business  ex- 
perience extends  over  that  period,  to 
name  the  time  of  the  most  hopeless 
prostration  that  could  be  imagined,  he 
wil!  name  exactly  those  years.  For  the 
North,  however,  it  was  a  very  pros- 
perous time.  In  actual  amount  of  pro- 
duction, or  production  per  capita,  or 
in  the  universal  employment  of  labor, 
or  in  wages  paid,  it  did  riot  equal  the 
years  from  1879  to  1883,  or  from  1888 
to  1892.  But  in  the  ratio  of  increase  of 
wealth  it  was  probably  higher  than  any 
other  period  within  the  memory  of  this 
generation.  It  is  worth  while  to  in- 
quire what  was  the  cause  of  that  pros- 
perity. 

We  may  get  a  great  deal  of  light  on 
that  point  if  we  first  show  what  was 
not  the  cause.  It  was  not  the  cause 
that  our  correspondent  supposes,  be- 
cause the  facts  of  that  period  flatly 
contradict  the  cheap  money  theory. 
That  theory  is  that  increase  in  the  vol- 
ume of  legal  tender  money  and  a  depre- 
ciation in  its  purchasing  power  make 
prosperity,  while  a  contracti6n  in  the 
legal  tender  circulation  and  a  rise  in 
its  value  make  it  impossible  to  produce 
wealth.  Now,  the  fact  is  that  this  per- 
iod which  our  correspondent  says  was 
the  best  the  country  ever  had,  was, 
more  than  any  other  period  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  country,  one  of  retirement 
of  legal  tenders,  and  of  advance  in  the 
purchasing  power  of  the  dollar.  We 
have  been  recently  criticised  by  our 
fiat  money  friends  because  we  do  not 
admit  that  the  legal  tender  issue  was 
retired  during  that  period,  and  in  the 
first  two  or  three  years  of  it,  from  over 
$1,600,000,000  to  $350,000,000.  The  fact 
is  enough  for  us  that  it  was  retired 
from  a  total  of  about  $650,000,000  to 
$350,000,000.  The  purchasing  power  of 
our  legal  tender  dollar  at  the  beginning 
of  1865  was  about  50  cents  in  gold.  At 
the  close  of  1871  it  was  91  cents.  It 
was  also  a  period  of  falling  prices.  So 
that  every  contention  of  the  cheap 
money  school  is  flatly  belied  by  the  fact 
that  this  was  a  period  when  the  people 
prospered,  material  wealth  increased, 


and  the  country  expanded  and  grew 
great  in  industry. 

We  are  not  contending  that  these  re- 
sults were  wholly  due  to  the  retirement 
o?  legal  tenders,  or  the  appreciation  of 
the  dollar.  We  are  making  it  plain  that 
there  are  other  causes,  some  of  them  en- 
tirely independent  of  the  monetary 
question,  some  of  them  inextricably 
mingled  with  it.  For  the  first  class,  the 
energies  of  the  people  had  just  before 
been  engaged  in  the  tasks  of  war  and 
stimulated  and  quickened  by  that 
mighty  effort  they  turned  to  the  tasks 
of  peace.  Before  them  were  immense 
and  virgin  resources  that  seemed  to  be 
illimitable.  Almost  any  field  was  so 
rich  as  to  yield  ample  rewards  to  in- 
dustry. Then,  too,  the  standard  of  liv- 
ing was  not  so  high  as  since.  Many  of 
the  luxuries  that  now  increase  the  cost 
of  life  were  then  unknown  and  what 
was  earned  beyond  the  cost  of  living 
went  into  new  production.  t 

But  beyond  question  one  of  the  vast 
influences  that  permitted  that  great 
leap  into  agricultural  and  industrial 
production  was  the  restoration  of  con- 
fidence. The  credit  of  the  nation  was 
restored  and  private  credit  gained  with 
it.  Here  may  be  seen  the  reason  of  the 
difference  between  the  industrial  con- 
dition of  the  North  and  South.  The 
credit  of  the  South  lay  prostrate  during 
these  years.  The  credit  of  the  North 
was  restored  by  the  outcome  of  the 
war.  Before  1865  the  majority  of  all 
Europe  and  a  portion  of  this  country 
doubted  whether  the  United  States 
could  survive  and  pay  its  debts.  Con- 
sequently, credit  was  lacking  and  the 
confidence  which  allows  enterprise  to 
expand  into  new  fields  was  absent. 
With  the  end  of  the  war  in  1865,  credit 
and  confidence  came  back  in  a  flood, 
and  prosperity  blossomed  as  never  be- 
fore. Here,  too,  it  is  shown  how  the 
monetary  question  is  concerned  with 
prosperity  in  the  fact  that  one  of  the 
strongest  influences  in  restoring  credit 
was  the  vigorous  way  in  which  the 
United  States  went  to  work  to  reduce 
its  debt,  and  appreciate  its  circulating 


37 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


money  toward  the  stable  coin  basis.  In 
that  connection,  also,  our  correspon- 
dent may  see  the  ground  for  a  fear  that 
a  change  in  the  standard  which  will 
injure  the  credit  may  produce  a  panic. 
Tho  lesson  of  the  period  thus  cited,  that 
legal  tender  circulation  may  be  reduced 
and  the  value  of  the  dollar  advanced, 
and  still  restored  credit  will  cause  the 
greatest  prosperity,  ought  to  be  a  con- 
vincing one. 

The  facts  are  instructive  in  relation 
to  the  subject  which  we  have  been  dis- 
cussing during  several  articles  past, 
presented  by  the  claim  of  the  free  sil- 
ver advocates,  that  declining  prices  are 
a  mark  of  prostration  and  ruin,  and  are 
caused  solely  by  an  advance  in  the  pur- 
chasing power  of  money.  In  the  period 
to  which  our  correspondent  refers,  the 
circulating  medium  of  the  country  ap- 
preciated about  80  per  cent,  but  prices 
did  not  decline  in  more  than  half  that 
ijatio;  and  it  is  declared  to  be  "the  best 
times  this  country  ever  had."  The  uni- 
versal misconception  of  the '  cheap 
money  school  on  this  point  is  illustrat- 
ed by  the  address  of  the  free  silver  se- 
ceders  from  the  Republican  convention, 
last  week.  That  document  enlarges  on 
the  calamity  of  falling  prices  and  the 
duty  of  legislation  to  raise  prices.  That 
makes  it  pertinent  to  add  something 
to  what  we  have  already  presented  on 
the  subject. 

Suppose,  to  take  the  subject  entirely 
apart  from  the  question  of  money  met- 
als, that  Congress  should  pass  a  law, 
that  every  dollar  bill  should  be  ac- 
cepted as  two  dollars;  every  five-dollar 
bill,  ten  dollars;  every  ten-dollar  bill, 
twenty  dollars,  and  so  on;  but,  in  order 
to  confine  the  question  to  the  relation 
of  the  standard  to  prosperity,  that  no 
debts  contracted  prior  to  the  enactment 
should  be  affected  thereby.  What  would 
be  the  result?  Everything  would  be 
worth  twice  as  much,  nominally,  be- 
cause all  prices  would  rise  in  propor- 
tion ;  but  the  same  dollar  bill  would  buy 
the  same  merchandise  when  it  was 
called  two  dollars,  as  when  it  was  called 
one.  Actual  values  and  prosperity 


would  not  be  changed  in  the  slightest 
degree.  The  same  absence  of  any  real 
result  would  be  apparent  if  Congress 
should  enact  that  the  dollar  be  called 
only  50  cents.  But  if  Congress  should 
make  its  legislation  include  that  when 
the  one  dollar  bill  is  called  two  dol- 
lars, it  shall  pay  two  dollars  of  debt, 
then  the  legislation  would  have  a  ma- 
terial effect.  It  would  not  create  any 
prosperity.  Not  an  atom  of  material 
wealth  would  be  added  to  the  world; 
but  in  the  division  of  that  wealth  half 
the  claim  of  the  creditor  would  be  tak- 
en away  and  given  to  the  debtor. 

This  shows  how  exclusively  the  whole 
proposition  of  legislation  on  the  money 
standard  affecting  prices,  refers  to  the 
question  of  debt.  We  shall  in  the  fu- 
ture go  thoroughly  into  that  aspect; 
but  as  regards  the  allegation  that  fall- 
ing prices  are  a  measure  of  oppression 
and  ruin  there  are  some  very  pertinent 
points  to  consider.  Apart  from  the 
question  of  the  standard,  the  fall  of 
prices  may  be  classed  as  due  to  two 
general  Causes. 

First,  the  reduction  of  prices  by  bus- 
in  eys  panic,  causing  a  restriction  of  de- 
mand Such  a  fall  is  a  mark  of  ad- 
versity at  the  time  it  takes  place.  It 
brings  its  own  remedy  in  the  fact  that 
when  prices  fall  below  the  cost  of  pro- 
duction the  supply  is  cut  off  and  prices 
are  restored.  Legislation  is  utterly 
powerless  to  prevent  or  remedy  such 
a  decline  except  by  maintaining  credit. 

Second,  the  reduction  of  prices  due  to 
improved  methods  of  production,  closer 
competition,  reduction  in  the  cost  of 
transportation  and  inventions  that  en- 
able the  same  labor  to  double  or  quad- 
ruple the  quantity  of  production.  Such 
a  fall  of  prices  is  the  .mark  of  human 
progress,  the  record  of  the  advance  of 
civilization. 

We  have  had  during  the  past  three 
years,  some  experience  of  the  decline 
of  prices  from  the  first  cause,  as  well  as 
the  restoring  influences  which  come 
into  action  as  soon  as  confidence  is  re- 
stored. But  in  declaring  that  legisla- 
tion should  turn  back  the  general 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


course  of  industrial  improvement  that 
has  produced  the  cheapening  of  prod- 
ucts, the  advocates  of  free  silver  at  St. 
Louis  commit  themselves  to  a  proposi- 
tion that,  if  it  did  not  demonstrate  their 
monumental  ignorance,  would  be  a 
monumental  crime  against  industry.  If 
legislation  could  restore,  in  the  United 
States,  the  prices  of  1870,  it  would  be 
a  destruction  of  industry  and  commerce 
and  a  calamity  unequaled  in  the  his- 
tory of  this  nation. 

We  have  heretofore  given  some  sta- 
tistics on  the  influences  that  reduce 
the  cost  of  the  great  staples,  both  to 
show  that  while  the  decline  has  been 
going  on,  the  result  has  been  unex- 
ampled increase  in  production,  and  to 
show  that  such  a  reduction  of  prices 
cannot  be  attributed  to  an  appreciation 
of  the  money  standard.  There  is  fur- 
ther remarkable  illustration  of  the  way 
in  which  industrial  improvement  affects 
prices  and  prosperity  to  be  found  in  the 
manufacturing  returns  of  the  eleventh 
census.  We  have  already  pointed  out 
that  from  1870  to  1890  the  number  of 
employes  in  manufacturing  industries 
increased  130  per  cent.  The  amount 
paid  in  wages  increased  still  more,  so 
that  the  average  wages  per  capita  ad- 
vanced 60  per  cent.  By  making  a  fur- 
ther comparison  with  the  total  prod- 
uct of  labor  in  those  industries,  we  can 
see  how  the  advance  in  wages  was  made 
possible: 

Inc.Pr. 

1870.    1890.Cent. 
Wages  per  employe...?    306  $   484    60 

Total   product 1,355    2,058    52 

Value  material 678    1,167    72 

Net  product 677       891     32 

Margin  371       4079.8 

Here  we  see  the  fact  that  the  im- 
provements increased  the  productive 
capacity  of  each  employe  more  than 
half  on  the  whole  value  of  product  and 
about  one-third  on  the  value  of  product 
after  deducting  the  cost  of  material, 
which,  by  reason  of  the  greater  output, 
was  increased  72  per  cent.  To  put  it  in 
another  way  each  employe  produced 
$703  more  in  value  of  product.  Of  that 


increase  $489  was  taken  in  the  increas- 
ed amount  of  material  used.  But  $214 
was  divided  by  giving  the  employe  $178 
more  wages  per  year  and  the  employer 
$36  more  for  the  net  return  from  each 
employe.  The  percentage  of  increase 
to  the  employer  is  the  smallest  item, 
but  is  offset  by  the  increase  in  the  to- 
tal operations.  The  margin  in  value  of 
product  over  wages  and  cost  of  mater- 
ials in  the  two  years  is  shown  as  fol- 
lows: 

1870.  1890. 

Wages  ....$  775,584,343  $2,283,216,529 
Material  ..  2,488,427,242  5,162,044,076 
Product  ...  4,232,325,442  9,372,437,283 
Margin  ...  968,313,957  1,927,176,678 

The  last  item  is,  of  course,  not  abso- 
lute profit,  as  it  must  cover  deprecia- 
tion and  repairs,  interest  on  investment 
and  expenses.  But  it  shows  that  while 
the  percentage  of  increase  to  the  em- 
ployer from  the  net  product  of  each  em- 
ploye was  the  apparently  small  one  of 
10  per  cent,  the  absolute  increase  in  the 
margin  to  all  employers  was  that  from 
nine  hundred  to  nineteen  hundred  mil- 
lions. 

Yet  this  does  not  show  the  whole  gain. 
It  shows  that  the  product  of  each  em- 
ploye stated  in  value  was  very  much 
enlarged  by  improved  methods,  not- 
withstanding the  decline  in  prices.  The 
great  gain  in  quantity  produced  by 
reason  of  the  improvements,  is  not  giv- 
en in  the  tables  covering  all  manufac- 
tures. But  an  illustration  of  the  opera- 
tion is  shown  in  the  returns  from  the 
chief  textile  and  metal  industries, 
covering  one-eighth  the  workmen  and 
one-ninth  the  total  products  in  value. 
The  following  shows  the  percentage  of 
increase  in  the  results  of  each  employe's 
labor  in  quantity  and  in  value  of  prod- 
uct from  1870  to  1890: 

Quantity.  Value. 

Cotton  goods 73  25 

Woolen  goods 34  13 

Iron    and    steel    rolling 

mills 84  43 

Blast  furnaces 283          110 

This  shows  the  greatest  and  best  re- 
sults of  the  improvements  that  have 


39 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


reduced  prices.  With  their  use  the  av- 
erage employe  produced  a  greater  quan- 
tity, ranging  from  one-third  more  in 
woolen  industries  up  to  nearly  three 
times  as  much  in  pig  iron.  But  of  that 
increase,  only  a  part  was  kept  for  the 
return  to  the  industry.  The  whole  out- 
put could  not  have  been  sold  except  by 
reduced  prices.  So  the  increase  in  value 
received  and  distributed  among  em- 
ployers and  employed,  as  we  have  just 
seen,  is  only  a  little  more  than  one- 
third  the  increase  in  quantity  of  pro- 
duction in  the  textile  fabrics,  and  a  lit- 
tle more  in  iron  and  steel.  While  the 
operation  of  the  influence  has  been  a 
great  gain,  as  shown  above,  to  employ- 
ers and  employed,  it  is  even  a  greater 
gain  to  the  public,  in  cheapened  prod- 
ucts. 

This  is  the  statistical  story  of  the 
operation  that  constitutes  the  progress 
of  civilization.  Invention  enables  the 
workman  to  produce  twice  as  many  tons 
of  steel,  or  yards  of  cloth,  as  he  has 
been  doing.  In  order  to  sell  the  addi- 
tional product  two-thirds  of  the  increase 
was  given  to  the  public  in  reduced 
prices;  the  other  third  gave  an  increase 
in  wages  to  the  workman,  and  in  profits 
to  the  employer.  Still  further,  the  re- 
duced prices  produced  an  expansion  of 
demand  that  caused  the  employment  of 
more  workmen,  and  additional  capital. 
If  prices  had  not  been  reduced  the 
growth  of  industry  could  not  have  taken 
place,  and  the  vast  benefits  of  the  im- 
provements would  have  been  lost. 

The  result  of  this  process  is  summed 
up  in  the  following  statistics  of  annual 
production  for  io70  and  1890,  or  cover- 
ing practically  the  same  period  that  is 
alleged  to  have  been  one  of  universal 
depression  and  inability  to  produce: 


1870. 


1890. 


Pig  iron,  tons 

Steel,  tons. . . 

No.  manufac- 
turing es- 
tablishm'ts 

No.      hands 
employed  .. 


1,665,179         9,202,703 
68,750         4,277,071 


252,448  355,410 

2,053,996         4,711,832 


Av.  annual  wag- 
es per  hand.  $306  $484 
No.   farms...          2,659,985         4,564,641 
Imp.  acres...      188,921,099     357,616,755 
Cereal     pro- 
duction, bu.  1,387,299,153  3,518,816,904 
Cotton,  Ibs...  1,307,000,000  3,564,000,000 
Value      agri- 
cul tural 
i  mp  1  e- 
ments    and 

machinery  $    336,878,429      494,247,467 
All  kinds  live 

stock,  head       85,000,000     160,000,000 
Value    farm 

lands   $7,410,000,000  18,279,000,000 

Total    value 

property  $24,053,000,000  65,073,000,000 
In  the  light  of  such  facts  what  are 
we  to  say  of  men  who  assert  that  the 
reduction  of  prices  that  marks  this 
process  of  improvement  must  be  re- 
versed by  legislation,  and  who  insist 
that  these  achievements  of  scientific  in- 
dustry are  an  evidence  of  the  oppres- 
sive appreciation  of  gold? 


X. — Inventions  and   Argument*. 

In  closing  up  the  discussion  of  the 
relation  of  the  decline  in  general  prices 
to  the  purchasing  power  of  gold,  a  lit- 
tle notice  should  be  given  to  a  claim, 
not  made  by  any  of  our  contributors, 
but  by  a  more  famous  bimetallist,  who, 
it  is  pertinent  to  say,  does  not  support 
free  coinage  by  the  United  States  alone. 
That  is  the  assertion  that,  although  the 
chief  factor  of  the  reduction  of  prices 
is  furnished  by  the  improvements  and 
inventions  that  enable  two  or  three 
times  as  much  of  certain  products  as 
formerly  to  be  produced  and  marketed, 
with  the  same  amount  of  labor,  never- 
theless that  reduction  is  properly  to  be 
taken  as  a  part  of  the  increased  pur- 
chasing power  of  gold,  because  gold 
will  purchase  more  of  all  the  products. 

This  may  be  correct  if  we  consider 
gold  solely  in  relation  to  other  products. 
But  if  we  consider  gold  in  relation  to 
the  amount  of  labor  required  to  earn  a 
given  sum,  it  is  wholly  incorrect.  To 


40 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


clear  the  question  of  prejudice,  let  us 
take  two  or  three  products  solely  in  re- 
lation to  each,  say  pork,  iron  and  cot- 
ton goods.  Postulate  that  the  three  have 
been  produced  at  certain  rates  so  that 
a  dollar  will  buy  a  given  quantity  of 
each.  Suppose  further  that  inventions 
permit  the  same  amount  of  labor  to  pro- 
duce twice  as  much  iron  or  cotton  goods 
as  before,  while  the  same  amount  of  la- 
bor will  produce  the  same  quantity  of 
pork.  The  result  will  be  that  pork  will 
buy  twice  as  much  iron  or  cotton  goods. 
It  has  appreciated  100  per  cent  in  rela- 
tion to  iron  and  calicoes.  But  in  rela- 
tion to  the  amount  of  labor  required  to 
produce  pork  there  has  been  no  change. 
This  is  true  whether  the  labor  is  ex- 
erted directly  in  producing  pork  or  in 
producing  iron  or  cotton  goods  to  ex- 
change for  It. 

The  same  rule  applies  to  gold.  The 
indictment  of  the  silver  men  is  that  the 
amount  of  labor  required  to  get  a 
thousand  dollars  to  pay  debts  is  great- 
er. The  farmer,  they  say,  has  to  pro- 
duce two  thousand  bushels  of  wheat 
to  get  a  thousand  dollars,  where  he 
could  formerly  get  the  same  sum  by 
producing  1,000  bushels  of  wheat.  But 
if  the  farmer  by  improved  inventions 
can  produce  the  two  thousand  bushels 
of  wheat  with  the  same  labor  as  it 
took  previously  to  produce  the  one 
thousand,  the  amount  of  his  labor  re- 
quired to  pay  $1,000  of  debt  has  not 
increased  at  all. 

With  the  purpose  of  making  each 
step  in  the  discussion  clear  beyond  dis- 
pute, we  have  now  gone  over  the  silver 
claim  that  the  standard  should  be  re- 
duced, because  demonetization  in  1873 
advanced  it;  that  gold  has  from  that 
ret  son  appreciated  100  per  cent;  that 
thus  debts  have  been  doubled;  that 
prices  have  been  reduced  one-half;  and 
that  the  measure  of  this  oppression  has 
been  that  debt  has  eaten  up  produc- 
tion, and  universal  distress  existed.  In 
answer  to  this  claim  we  have  shown: 

First — That  the  great  mass  of  reduc- 
tion of  prices  has  been  due  to  improve- 
ments in  the  methods  of  production, 


typified  in  the  statement  that  the  same 
labor  can  produce  twice  the  product, 
giving  two-thirds  of  the  increase  to 
the  public  in  reduced  prices,  while 
both  employer  and  employed  get  a 
greater  return  from  the  operation.  Such 
reductions  in  price  are  an  index  of  in- 
dustrial progress. 

Second — That  in  staples  where  such 
improvements  have  not  been  the  ruling 
industrial  factors,  the  decline  in  prices 
has  not  been  marked. 

Third— That  the  result  of  the  indus- 
trial conditions  during  the  period  from 
1873  to  1893  was  not  adversity  or  dis- 
tress, but  one  of  remarkable  expansion 
in  wealth  and  production,  the  increase 
in  wealth  from  1870  to  1890  having  been 
170  per  cent  in  the  aggregate,  while  the 
increase  in  wealth  and  production  per 
capita  was  very  positive. 

Fourth— That,  so  far  from  the  coun- 
try being  eaten  up  with  debt,  debt  has 
not  increased  as  much  as  the  wealth 
of  the  country,  and  that  where  debts 
have  been  largely  increased  they  fur- 
nished the  means  for  this  industrial 
expansion. 

Fifth— That,  taking  all  these  factors 
into  consideration,  and  comparing  them 
with  the  tables  of  the  best  authorities, 
they  indicate  that,  while  silver  has  de- 
preciated far  more  than  the  average  of 
prices,  the  alleged  advance  of  100  per 
cent  in  the  purchasing  power  of  gold, 
up  to  1892,  does  not  much,  if  any,  exceed 
10  per  cent. 

The  statistics  on  which  most  of  these 
comparisons  are  based  were  taken  from 
the  census  reports  of  1870  and  1890, 
simply  because  they  were  the  official 
figures  obtainable.  In  some  cases  we 
have  carried  the  comparison  up  to  the 
more  recent  years.  The  evidences  we 
have  cited,  of  prosperity  up  to  1890, 
which  continued  through  1892,  are  not 
intended  to  avoid  the  fact  that  we  had 
adversity  since  then.  Nor  do  they  con- 
ceal that  prices  have  declined  severely 
in  the  last  two  or  three  years.  But 
they  do  show  that  if  20  years  of  de- 
monetization permitted  the  country  to 
increase  in  wealth  and  multiply  its 


41 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


products  as  it  has  done,  while  three 
years  of  injured  credit  has  wrought  the 
evil,  the  cause  alleged  by  the  silver 
advocates  is  not  the  true  reason  of 
present  hardships. 

It  is  not  intended,  either,  in  affirm- 
ing the  expansion  of  material  wealth 
from  1873  to  1893,  to  declare  that  the 
distribution  of  that  wealth  has  been  as 
equitable  as  it  should  be.  The  Dis- 
patch has  often  pointed  out  and  opposed 
the  influences  which  concentrate  undue 
wealth  in  the  hands  of  trust  manipu- 
lators, and  favorites  of  the  great  com- 
binations. But  that  these  evils  are  not 
caused  by  the  gold  standard  is  proved 
.  by  the  facts  already  cited. 

The  summary  from  these  facts  is 
worth  remembering: 

1.— Demonetization  did  not  ruin 
prosperity,  but  the  period  of  stable 
cnrrency  and  assured  credit  im- 
mensely increased  it. 

2.— Gold  has  not  reduced  prices 
more  than  ten  per  cent,  but  improv- 
ed machinery,  transportation  and 
new  fields  of  production  have  re- 
duced them  much  more. 

8.— The  reduction  of  prices  from 
the  latter  causes  has  been  a  great 
benefit,  symbolized  by  the  increase 
of  industrial  wages  6O  per  cent. 

4.— The  injury  to  production  by 
three  years  of  legislative  meddling 
with  business,  and  disturbed  confi- 
dence, has  been  greater  than  any  in- 
Jury  that  can  be  discovered  in  20 
years  of  alleged  demonetization. 

We  will  make  the  conclusion  final 
with  one  more  statistical  fact.  The 
average  annual  production  of  gold  dur- 
ing the  23  years  since  1873  has  been  re- 
duced only  about  8  per  cent  from  that 
for  the  23  years  previous,  and  for  the 
past  four  years  has  been  much  greater. 
The  production  of  silver  since  1873  has 
been  increased  nearly  three  times  that 
before  1873  in  annual  average,  and  the 
product  of  the  years  1891  to  1893  was 
four  to  five  times  greater.  With  these 
facts  we  regard  it  as  definitely  settled 
that  the  disparity  between  silver  and 
gold  is  mainly  due  to  the  decline  in 


silver,  and  not  to  the  advance  in  gold. 

X.— Inventions  and   Arguments. 

The  contributions  of  our  free  silver 
friends  to-day  indicate  a  desire  to  re- 
sume discussion  on  some  points  already 
gone  ovef. 

We  take  up  with  pleasure  the  contri- 
bution signed  "Bimetallist,"  because 
that  writer  has,  at  least,  the  ability  to 
pursue  a  consecutive  train  of  ideas. 
He  selects  for  his  theme  this  time  the 
question  of  prices  as  bearing  on  the  al- 
leged advance  on  gold,  and  develops 
at  length  an  argument  which,  if  he  had 
fully  grasped  the  meaning  of  our  pre- 
vious articles  on  the  subject,  he  would 
have  seen  to  be  fully  answered.  But 
as  the  meaning  of  the  statistical  ex- 
hibits cited  on  this  point  may  not  have 
been  as  clear  as  they  should  have  been, 
we  are  glad  of  the  opportunity  afforded 
by  his  communication  to  go  over  them 
again. 

Our  contributor  commences  his  argu- 
ment to  prove  that  where  an  invention 
enables  the  same  labor  to  double  or 
quadruple  the  product  of  any  staple  the 
price  should  not  decline,  by  requesting 
The  Dispatch  to  make  a  direct  answer 
to  the  following  questions: 

Are  the  holders  of  money  or  moneyed 
obligations  entitled  to  the  increase  of 
production,  or  are  the  producers  en- 
titled to  it? 
To  which  we  answer: 
The  holders  of  money  or  moneyed  ob- 
ligations are  not  entitled  to  it  and  have 
never  got  it.  By  the  laws  of  nature, 
which  legislation  cannot  change,  both 
producers  and  consumers  are  entitled  to 
it,  because  the  producers  cannot  get 
the  advantage  of  the  increase  without 
giving  the  consumers  a  share  of  the 
benefit. 

"Bimetallist's"  extended  argument  on 
the  illustration  from  wheat  and  steel 
rails  is  a  case  of  arguing  in  a  circle. 
He  first  alleges  that  the  fall  of  wheat 
and  steel  rails  indicates  an  advance  in 
gold,  because  it  takes  more  bushels  of 
wheat  or  more  tons  of  steel  rails  to  pay 
the  interest  or  principal  of  $10,000. 
Then  he  proceeds  to  argue  with  great 


42 


A.  SILVER 


care  that  the  effect  of  invention  cannot 
be  justly  credited  with  the  fall  of  prices 
in  these  staples,  because  it  takes  more 
bushels  of  wheat  or  more  tons  of  steel 
rails  to  pay  the  interest  or  principal  of 
$10,000.  All  this  is  entirely  punctured 
by  a  single  statement  of  fact,  the  dem- 
onstration of  which  has  already  been 
made,  and  which  we  propose  to  repeat. 
It  took  in  1890  no  greater  total  of  hu- 
man labor  and  effort  to  produce  enough 
of  either  wheat  or  steel  rails  to  buy  a 
thousand  dollars'  worth  of  gold,  than  it 
did  in  1873. 

It  happens  that  one  of  the  staples 
which  our  correspondent  cites  is  a  lead- 
ing part  of  very  exact  and  authoritative 
statistics.  The  report  of  the  census  on 
selected  industries  does  not  give  the 
figures  necessary  to  show  the  operation 
of  the  influences  of  improved  processes 
o;i  steel  rails  by  themselves;  but  the 
figures  on  all  kinds  of  rolled  iron  and 
steel  do  give  them.  We  adduced  some 
figures  from  that  authority,  giving  the 
comparison  between  1870  and  1890. 
Since  our  correspondent  takes  the  per- 
iod from  1880  to  1890,  we  adopt  that 
comparison,  with  all  the  more  readi- 
ness that  it  affords  a  very  clear  illus- 
tration of  the  principle.  The  steel  rail 
industry  by  itself  would  probably  ex- 
hibit the  operation  more  clearly. 

The  following  comparison  of  the  av- 
erage earnings,  productive  power  in 
quantity  and  productive  power  in  value, 
with  margin  to  the  employer,  for  each 
employe  in  the  iron  and  steel  mills,  is 
taken  from  the  United  States  Census 
report  on  selected  industries: 

1880.       1890. 

No.  of  employes 96,164    140,537 

Av.    annual    wages    per 

employe  £436          $566 

Tons  produced,  per  em-  • 

ploye 36  59 

Value   product,    per   em- 
ploye   $2,117      $2,370 

Value  materials,  per  em- 
ploye   $1,355      $1,545 

Net   value   product,    per 

employe 762  825 

Margin  to  employer,  per 
employe 326  259 


There,  if  it  is  properly  understood,  Is 
a  very  clear  illustration  of  the  working 
of  improvements  which  cheapen  pro- 
duction, and  their  value  to  all  classes. 
By  the  adoption  of  such  improvements, 
the  average  productive  power  of  each 
employe  in  the  iron  and  steel  mills  of 
the  United  States,  was  increased  in 
quantity  just  about  two-thirds  in  a 
single  decade.  If  that  gain  had 
been  confined  strictly  to  the  producers 
they  could  have  sold  no  more  products 
than  they  did  in  1879.  But  by  the  oper- 
ation which  has  made  these  inventions 
the  factors  of  the  age's  growth,  a  large 
share  of  this  gain  was  given  to  the 
consumers  in  reduced  prices.  While 
the  quantity  handled  was  about  64  per 
cent  greater,  the  net  money  product  of 
each  employe's  labor,  or  the  value  of 
the  product  less  the  cost  of  material 
was  only  raised  about  8  per  cent.  Yet 
that  increase  was  enough  to  secure  the 
greatest  benefits  to  the  community.  By 
the  cheapening  of  the  staple  it  enabled 
140,000  men  to  be  employed  where  only 
96,000  previously  found  work.  And  of 
the  140,000  everyone  averaged  $130  in- 
crease of  wages,  or  just  about  30  per 
cent  more  than  the  average  of  the  96,000 
in  1880.  Neither  the  increased  sale  per 
employe  nor  the  expansion  of  the  entire 
industry  could  have  been  secured  ex- 
cept by  the  reduction  in  prices. 

To  put  it  in  another  way:  K  the  in- 
creased product  by  improved  processes 
could  have  been  sold  at  the  prices  of 
1879,  the  increase  in  gross  value  of 
product  would  have  been  $1,352  per  em- 
ploye. But  consumption  would  not  take 
the  increase  at  the  old  prices.  By  the 
lav,  of  trade,  therefore,  under  which 
competition  secures  the  reduction  of 
prices  and  thereby  enlarges  the  con- 
sumption so  that  over  8,000,000  tons 
could  be  sold  where  before  but  3,400,000 
were  marketed,  all  but  $253  of  this 
gain  per  employe  was  given  to  the  con- 
sumer. But  the  increase  of  the  in- 
dustry was  so  marked  that  the  wages 
of  the  laborer  were  advanced  $130i  Be- 
yond that,  while  the  quantity  of  mater- 
ial used  had  increased  about  two- 


SYMPOSIUM. 


thirds,  the  similar  operation  going  on 
in  the  pig  iron  industry  reduced  the 
increase  in  the  -value  of  material  to 
$190  per  employe,  or  about  13  per  cent. 
The  reduction  in  the  cost  of  material 
permitted  the  increased  consumption  in 
this  industry  and  therefore  a  corre- 
sponding increase  of  wages  and  expan- 
sion of  output,  in  the  pig  iron  trade. 

This  brings  us  to  another  very  inter- 
esting and  pertinent  point,  especially  in 
connection  with  our  correspondent's  as- 
sertions. The  increase  in  the  wages 
and  cost  of  material  used  per  employe 
has  been .  shown  to  be  $320,  while  the 
increase  in  money  return  per  employe 
was  but  $253.  This  makes  the  margin 
for  the  employer  on  each  employe's 
wages  actually  less,  being  $259  in  1890, 
to  $326  in  1880.  At  first  sight  this  looks 
as  if  the  employer  was  getting  the 
worst  of  it.  But  when  we  take  into 
account  that  the  number  of  employes 
was  much  greater,  and  figure  up  the 
margin  on  the  total  operations,  we  find 
that  it  was  $31,290,000  in  1880,  and  $36,- 
298,000  in  1890.  The  ratio  of  this  net 
return  to  capital  invested  was  very 
much  less  in  1890  than  in  1880.  Yet 
$162,000,000  of  additional  capital  went 
into  the  industry  in  the  decade.  The 
owners  of  this  $162,000,000  had  the 
choice  whether  to  put  it  into  industry  or 
interest-bearing  securities,  and  they 
chose  the  former.  Did  the  keen  men 
whose  knowledge  of  practical  finance 
is  equal  to  that  of  any  other  class,  put 
$162,000,000  into  an  industry  when  they 
could  have  appropriated  the  whole  in- 
crease by  putting  their  capital  into 
money  or  moneyed  obligations?  That 
capital  went  into  the  industry  because 
it  could  get  greater  returns  there  than 
in  the  low  rates  of  interest  on  notes. 
While  the  margin  of  profit  has  de- 
creased, we  can  assure  our  correspon- 
dent that,  if  muddling  our  finances  does 
not  break  up  the  country,  neither  Mr. 
Carnegie,  Mr.  Frick,  Mr.  Johnson  nor 
any  of  the  other  great  manufacturers 
whose  wealth  has  been  made  under 
this  alleged  system  of  giving  their  prof- 
its to  the  holder  of  money,  will  become 


slaves  to  the  oppressive  money-lender. 

The  same  proof  appears  with  even 
greater  clearness  in  the  returns  for 
the  capital  of  all  manufacturing  in- 
dustries. This  same  contributor  to  the 
free  silver  argument  asserts  that  "in 
this  country  it  pays  better  to  withdraw 
the  money  from  productive  industries 
and  place  it  in  bonds,  mortgages  or 
other  moneyed  obligations;  in  silver 
countries  it  pays  better  to  withdraw 
money  from  moneyed  obligations  and 
place  it  in  productive  industries."  This 
is  a  singular  assertion,  as  a  question 
of  fact,  and  still  more  unique  as  an 
economic  theory.  How  can  money  be 
put  into  any  interest-bearing  form  if 
it  is  not  used  in  productive  industries? 
The  investor  who  buys  bonds,  lends 
on  mortgages  or  discounts  commercial 
paper,  puts  the  money  into  productive 
industries.  The  only  way  that  he  can 
withdraw  it  from  productive  industry 
is  to  lock  it  up  in  a  safe  and  get  no  in- 
come from  it.  If  the  silver  countries 
are  not  using  bonds,  mortgages  or  other 
moneyed  obligations  as  freely  as  the 
United  States,  it  is  because  their  pro- 
ductive machinery  is  not  so  highly  or- 
ganized. 

Now,  both  as  to  this  remarkable  as- 
sertion, and  as  to  the  other  already  dis- 
cussed, that  the  holders  of  moneyed  ob- 
ligations appropriate  the  increase  of 
industries,  there  is  a  very  exact  test 
in  the  fact  that  in  1870  there  was  $1,- 
694,567,015  capital  in  manufacturing  in- 
dustries; in  1890  there  was  $6,139,307,- 
785.  There  was  about  $4,500,000,000  of 
new  capital  put  into  manufacturing  in 
the  two  decades;  $1,100,000,000 from  1870 
to  1880,  and  $3,600,000,000  between  1880 
and  1890.  The  men  who  put  in  that 
new  capital  were  among  the  best  in- 
formed business  men  in  the  country. 
They  had  the  option  whether  to  put 
the  $4,500,000,000  into  bonds  and  mort- 
gages or  into  manufacturing  plants, 
and  they  showed  which  yielded  the 
best  return  by  putting  it  into  manufac- 
turing plants. 

The  same  thing  is  true  of  wheat,  with 
the  addition  that  while  the  same  labor 


44 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


will  produce  more  wheat  than  former- 
ly, it  is  further  depressed  by  the 
competition  of  other  countries.  No 
change  in  our  monetary  standard  will 
prevent  India,  Egypt,  Russia  and  Ar- 
gentina from  competing  with  us  in  the 
European  markets. 

We  do  not  think  that  an  intelligent 
mao  like  our  contributor  would  com- 
mit himself  to  the  proposition  that  in- 
ventions and  improvements  must  not 
cheapen  prices,  if  he  understood  exact- 
ly what  such  a  proposition  meant.  The 
work  of  inventions  and  improvements 
in  cheapening  prices  constitutes  the 
progress  of  the  last  century.  Except 
for  that  cheapening,  all  the  growth 
that  the  age  of  steam  and  iron  has  pro- 
duced would  have  been  unknown.  The 
cheapening  of  production,  the  cheap- 
ening of  transportation  and  the  conse- 
quent ability  to  employ  and  sustain 
many  times  more  people  are  exactly  the 
results  of  that  principle  which  this 
writer  thinks  is  a  sign  of  a  dishonest 
monetary  system.  The  fact  is,  that  the 
only  relation  of  the  monetary  system 
to  that  vast  operation  of  advanced  civ- 
ilization is  that  credit  and  confidence 
permit  it  to  be  carried  on  with  profit. 
But  if  it  were  possible  for  silver  stu- 
pidity to  undo  the  cheapening  and  in- 
crease of  production  by  inventions— 
which  fortunately  it  is  not — and  to  turn 
us  back  to  the  conditions  of  1870  or 
1850,  it  would  be  the  industrial  crime 
of  the  age  to  do  it. 

*    *    * 

XI.— Free  Coinage  Delusions. 

The  criticisms  of  a  considerable  num- 
ber of  free  silver  disputants  on  the 
points  established  by  the  arguments 
during  the  preceding  discussion,  call 
for  some  attention.  Among  them  we 

take  up  the  complaint  of  Mr.  K , 

that  while  the  material  wealth  is  the 
true  measure  of  prosperity,  the  coun- 
try needs  the  "tools"  with  which  to 
prosecute  productive  enterprises.  Mr. 
K alleges  that  "the  tools"  con- 
sist of  money.  We  think  they  are 
credit;  but  he  comes  near  enough  to  the 
truth  to  have  the  fact  recognized.  More- 


over, the  following  statement  shows 
that  the  nation  did  have  the  money, 
and  has  got  it  now.  It  gives  the  money 
of  the  United  States  in  various  years, 
with  the  proportion  per  capita: 

Total  of      Per 
Circulation.  Capita. 

1860  $    442,102,477     $13.85 

1865 745,129,755      20.57 

1878 766,253,576      15.32 

1883  1,643,489,816      22.91 

1890  2,144,226,159      22.82 

1894 2,240,647,833      23.99 

These  figures  should  be  taken  sub- 
ject to  the  understanding  that  the  to- 
tal of  circulation  gives  the  amounts 
both  in  the  Treasury  and  outside  of  it, 
making  a  duplication  of  the  coinage  and 
certificates  issued  on  it.  But  the  cir- 
culation per  capita  is  the  amount  out- 
side the  Treasury  and  contains  no  such 
duplication.  The  circulation  outside  of 
the  Treasury  in  1873  was  $751,881,809, 
or  $18.04  per  capita;  in  1895  it  was  $1,- 
601,968,  473,  or  $22.97  per  capita.  This 
does  not  indicate  the  absolute  lack  of 
tools,  that  our  free  silver  friend  alleges. 

Mr.  J.  H.  S brings  up  the  same 

point  in  his  argument  to  rescue 
his  friends  from  the  charge  of 
having  shifted  from  their  original 
position,  which  is  a  contribution  to 
the  farco-comedy  style  of  argu- 
ment. Mr.  S -asserts  that  every 

addition  to  the  circulation,  wheth- 
er silver,  gold,  or  national  bank 
notes,  "cheapens  the  value  of  all." 

Mr.    S —    attempts    to    put    The 

Dispatch  in  an  inconsistent  attitude  as 
opposing  the  cheapening  of  the  dollar 
while  supporting  the  policy  which,  ac- 
cording to  his  axiom,  has  cheapened  it. 
We  decline  to  be  put  anywhere  by  any 

axioms  of  Mr.  S 's  manufacture. 

But  a  man  may  be  fairly  supposed  to 
be  bound  by  his  own  axioms;  and  let 
us  see  where  his  axiom  lands  Mr. 

S .     He  asserts  this  principle  as 

bearing  on  the  solitary  action  of  the 
United  States.  The  fact  is,  as  just 
shown,  that  the  United  States  has  since 
1873,  largely  added  to  its  circulation. 
According  to  Mr.  S 's  axiom,  he 


45 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 

should  be  overflowing  with  approval  by  an  alleged  enormous  appreciation  in 
and  enthusiasm  for  the  cheapening  of  the  gold  standard  do  not  indicate  an 
the  gold  basis  that  has  gone  on.  Yet,  implicit  faith  in  the  controlling  and 
neither  he  nor  his  friends  appear  to  be  eternal  verity  of  the  axiom, 
satisfied.  Moreover,  the  axiom  pro-  A  word  is  necessary  with  regard  to 
duces  a  more  remarkable  result  when  the  claim  of  "Bimetallist,"  that  bonds 
we  submit  it  to  the  test  of  world-wide  can  only  be  retired  under  the  silver  re- 
statistics.  The  world's  coinage  of  gime.  He  asserts  that  if  the  old  sys-, 
gold  and  silver  for  20  years  since  the  tern  is  kept  up  the  debt  must  be  main- 
alleged  crime  of  1873,  is  as  follows:  tained.  This  is  said  in  apparent  ignor- 
Year.  Gold.  Silver.  ance  of  the  fact  that  under  the  system 

1873    $   257,630,802  $   131,544,464  which  he  says  necessitates  the  bonds, 

1874   135,778,387       102,931,232  more    than    a  thousand    millions     of 

1875 205,340,209       123,143,842  bonds  have  been  retired.        It  is  true 

1876   213,119,278       126,577,164  that   $262,000,000   of   new   bonds   have 

1877   173,675,555         78,402,648  been     issued,      under     circumstances 

1878   188,388,611       161,191,913  which  make  it  past  dispute  that  the  de- 

1879   90,752,811       104,888,313  crease  or  increase  of  the  bonded  debt 

1S80    .......      149,725,081         84,611,974  depends  solely  on  whether  the  expendi- 

1881   147,015,275       108,010,086  tures  of  the  Government  are  within  or 

1882   99,697,170       110,785,934  in  excess  of  the  revenues. 

1883    104,845,114       109,306,705  The  assertion  of  our  friend,  "A  Re- 

1884   99,432,795         95,832,084  publican,"  of  Alliance,  that  the  farmers 

1885 95,757,582       126,764,574  think    gold    means    contraction     and 

1886 94,642,070       124,854,101  harder  times  is  an  evidence  of  the  need 

1887  .......      124,992,465       163,411,397  of  full  and  free  discussion.    If  the  far- 

1888   '.      134,828,853       134,922,344  mers  should  learn  from  the  discussion 

1889  .......      168,901,519       139,242,595  that  the  gold  basis  from  1879  to  1892 

1890  ... 149,095,865       151,032,820  did  not  produce  contraction,  and  that 

1891 119,310,014       135,508,083  free  coinage  would  produce  contraction 

1892  .......       34,787,223         12,641,078  and  loss  of  credit,  their  opinion  and 

vote  on  the  subject  might  be  a  little 

Total  ....$2,787,716,679  $2,325,603,221  more  judicious  than  it  is  alleged  to  be 

E  e  t,     stock  by  our  correspondent. 

1892    3,711,845,000    3,939,578,000          To  satisfy  the  demand  of  Mr.  N 

The  statistics  in  our  possession  on  that  we  shall  discuss  what  is  the  best 
this  point  end  in  1892,  so  that  the  show-  material  for  a  circulating  medium,  we 
ing  is  for  an  even  20  years.  Some  al-  must  first  distinguish  between  the  cir- 
lowance  should  be  made  for  recoinage  culating  medium  and  the  basis  for  it. 
of  gold,  which  might  reduce  the  addi-  The  best  medium,  except  for  small 
tion  to  the  stock  of  gold  coin  to  below  change,  is  a  paper  currency  readily 
$2,500,000,000.  convertible  into  coin.  The  question  of 
According  to  this  axiom,  this  enor-  what  is  the  best  coin  as  a  basis  for  that 
mous  increase  of  the  world's  stock  of  circulation,  and  as  a  standard  of  values 
money  must  have  cheapened  the  gold  is  what  we  understand  our  correspon- 
standard  amazingly.  If  his  axiom  is  dent  to  raise,  and  what  is  at  issue  in 
true  the  debtor  has  prospered  by  the  this  country  to-day.  The  qualities 
reduction,  and  the  whole  course  of  which  are  necessary  in  material  for 
events  has  been  a  gigantic  satisfaction  coinage  are,  first,  as  little  fluctuation  in 
to  those  who  wish  the  standard  lower-  values  as  possible,  and  therefore  even 
ed.  Yet  somehow  the  conclamations  and  gradual  changes  in  production  and 
of  Mr.  S and  his  associates,  on  the  demand;  second,  ability  to  resist  de- 
fact  that  the  debtor  has  been  oppressed  sti  action  by  corrosion  and  friction; 

46 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


third,  the  common  acceptance  by  the 
commercial  world  of  its  value;  fourth, 
malleability,  in  order  that  the  material 
may  be  coined;  fifth,  the  compression  of 
these  values  within  small  space  and 
weights,  so  that  payments  may  be 
made  without  undue  cost. 

It  is  the  experience  and  common  con- 
sent of  the  world  that  gold  and  silver 
combine  these  qualities  to  a  greater  de- 
gree than  any  other  substances  known 
to  mankind.  Therefore,  gold  and  silver 
have  long  been  accepted  as  the  two 
money  metals.  As  between  the  two, 
gold  is  somewhat  superior  in  its  resis- 
tance to  corrosion,  and  rather  more  so 
in  the  universal  acceptability  wherever 
commerce  extends.  But  in  the  last 
and  most  important  respect,  the  value 
of  a  given  weight  or  bulk,  gold  is  the 
superior  in  the  ratio  of  30  to  1,  as  fixed 
by  the  world's  markets  to-day.  If  it 
costs  one-half  of  1  per  cent  of  the  value 
of  $10,000  in  gold  to  transport  it  to  a 
distant  country  to  purchase  merchan- 
dise, it  would  cost  30  times  as  much,  or 
15  per  cent,  to  transport  the  equiva- 
lent value  of  silver  there,  and  that 
difference  might  be  prohibitory  in  com- 
merce. 

Mr.  G.  W —  — 's  desire  to  know  what 
difference  it  makes  to  the  creditor 
whether  he  has  to  take  silver  dollars 
"under  bimetallism  by  the  United 
States  alone,  or  bimetallism  by  a  num- 
ber of  nations,"  deserves  satisfaction. 
Interposing  the  remark  that  free  coin- 
age by  the  United  States  alone  will  not 
be  bimetallism,  but  silver  monometal- 
lism, the  answer  is  that  an  agreement 
by  the  leading  commercial  nations  can 
establish  the  silver  dollar  on  a  basis 
of  value  approximating  that  of  gold. 
Therefore  under  international  bimet- 
allism the  creditor  who  took  a  silver 
dollar  would  get  one  that  was  worth 
nearly,  if  not  quite,  as  much  as  the 
gold  dollar.  The  subject  is  touched  by 
the  communication  signed  "W,"  in  yes- 
terday's Dispatch,  which  asks  proof 
that  either  international  or  national 
legislation  can  maintain  the  ratio  so 
that  it  will  not  vary.  Legislation  can- 


not do  so;  but  the  action  of  a  full  in- 
ternational demand  can  minimize  the 
fluctuations.  This  has  already  been 
pointed  out  with  regard  to  the  fluc- 
tuations of  gold  and  silver  in  the  '50's 
and  '60's.  For  the  present  it  is  enough 
to  say  that  while  for  the  reason  above 
stated  international  bimetallism  is  pre- 
ferable to  monometallism,  either  of  gold 
or  silver,  the  scientific  solution  will  be 
in  the  line  suggested  by  Mr.  Anson 
Phelps  Stokes,  of  a  standard  composed 
of  the  joint  value  of  the  two  metals, 
which  will  therefore  follow,  -not  the 
fluctuations  of  the  cheaper  metal  as 
under  the  old  bimetallism,  but  the  mean 
of  the  fluctuations  of  both  metals. 

Mr.  W 's  further  inquiry,  wheth- 
er we  have  any  "dishonest  dollars,"  is 
erecting  a  figure  of  speech  into  rather 
excessive  prominence.  A  piece  of  met- 
al or  paper  cannot,  in  strict  language, 
have  moral  qualities.  The  phrase,  of 
course,  refers  to  the  policy  back  of  the 
dollar.  As  long  as  the  United  States 
secures  that  the  holder  of  every  dollar 
can  obtain  its  full  value,  we  have  no 
"dishonest  dollars." 


Mr.  J- 


-'s  illustration  of  an  im- 


partial judgment  in  the  fact  that  noth- 
ing which  militates  against  his  views 
has  any  force,  in  his  opinion,  is  inter- 
esting. The  Dispatch  cited  the  sta- 
tistics of  coinage  to  show  that  since 
1873  the  United  States  had  coined  an 
immense  amount  of  silver,  and  that 
before  1873  it  coined  practically  no  sil- 
ver at  all,  except  fractional  coins.  This 

Mr.    J- says   has   "no   force"   in 

showing  that  the  talk  about  striking 
down  half  the  stock  of  money  by  the 
crime  of  1873  is  an  immense  humbug, 
because  the  silver,  owing  to  the  lower 
ratio  in  European  countries,  went 
abroad  and  "assisted  in  keeping  down 
the  price  of  gold."  How  this  disproves 
the  showing  of  the  statistics  that  the 
United  States  did  not,  prior  to  1873, 
have  half  of  its  monetary  system  in 
silver,  and  therefore  that  the  act  of 
1873  could  not  "strike  down  half  our 
money,"  is  likely  to  puzzle  everyone 
except  Mr,  J — - — .  This  is  followed 


47 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


further  by  striking  inaccuracies  both 
of  view  and  statement.  The  silver  that 
went  to  Europe  did  not,  as  he  asserts, 
assist  in  keeping  down  the  price  of 
gold.  On  the  contrary,  as  gold  was  the 
cneaper  metal  already  and  as  the  sil- 
ver in  the  fifties  went  for  coinage  only 
to  the  silver  monometallic  countries,  it 
assisted  in  keeping  down  the  price  of 
silver  from  a  still  further  advance,  and 
thus  in  relatively  keeping  up  the  price 
of  gold.  While  thus  displaying  his 
confused  idea  of  the  action  of  the  law 

of  real  bimetallism,  Mr.  J seems 

to  have  a  suspicion  that  he  is  not  on 
strong  ground,  for  he  finally  lands  on 
the  assertion  that  "the  law  of  1873  did 
wipe  out  half  the  redemption  money 
of  the  world."  This  remarkable  exten- 
sion of  the  powers  of  Congress  to  legis- 
late on  the  coinage  of  the  whole  world 
may  not  jar  the  free  silverite  faith  IP 
its  own  arguments.  But  it  may  sug- 
gest to  the  impartial  mind  the  fact 
which  The  Dispatch  has  been  urging, 
that  the  action  of  a  country  which  had 
no  silver  did  not  wipe  out  any  silver 
money,  and  that  the  only  thing  the 
United  States  has  done  in  connection 
with  the  disuse  of  silver  was  to  im- 
mensely increase  its  use  by  the  act  of 
1873,  as  well  as  subsequent  acts. 


As  to  Mr.  J- 


-'s  argument  that  the 


It  is  but  just  to  say  that  Mr.  J- 


-'s 


challenge  to  produce  a  journal  giving 
an  account  of  the  demonetization  of 
silver  was  written  and  sent  to  The  Dis- 
patch before  we  had  proved  from  the 
Congressional  Globe,  published  at  the 
time,  and  furnished  to  every  man  who 
desired  to  follow  the  course  of  legisla- 
tion, that  the  silver  coinage  which  the 
United  States  actually  used  was  de- 
monetized in  1853;  was  demonetized  be- 
cause it  was  the  dearest  metal;  and  was 
demonetized  on  the  plain  and  practically 
unanimous  avowal  of  establishing  the 
single  gold  standard;  that  in  1873  all 
that  was  demonetized  was  the  coin  that 
had  never  constituted  one  in  $100  of  our 
coinage;  and  that  this  was  clearly  stat- 
ed in  the  debates  in  the  presence  of 
men  subsequently  leaders  of  the  free 
silver  cause. 


people  believe  the  fabrication,  that 
may  or  may  not  be  true.  But  we  pro- 
pose that  if  any  one  of  The  Dispatch's 
readers  believes  it  in  the  future,  it 
shall  be  because  he  is  determined  to 
believe  it  in  the  face  of  the  clear  evi- 
dence to  the  contrary. 

Another  communication  is  elicited  by 
the  reference  the  other  day  to  the  im- 
portation of  foreign  silver  under  free 
coinage.  This  correspondent  is  frank 
and  intelligent  enought  to  recognize 
that  free  coinage  would  bring  our  dol- 
lar down  to  the  bullion  value  of  silver, 
but  he  then  proceeds  to  develop  an 
imaginary  theory  that  by  descending 
to  50-cent  dollars,  the  producers  of  this 
country  would  be  able  to  undersell 
their  competing  producers  in  nations 
with  100-cent  dollars.  It  is  a  remark- 
able illustration  of  the  logic  of  the  free 
silver  cult  that  such  an  utterly  base- 
less idea  can  be  advanced  seriously. 
The  only  way  in  which  any  such  result 
could  be  imagined  would  be  by  suppos- 
ing that  the  change  in  our  currency 
would  so  impose  on  workingmen  and 
farmers  as  to  make  them  give  as  much 
of  their  work  for  a  50-cent  dollar  as 
they  do  now  for  a  100-cent  dollar.  The 
idea  is  moonshine.  It  is  true  that  the 
depreciation  of  the  standard  always  in- 
flicts a  temporary  injury  on  labor,  be- 
cause wages  are  generally  the  last  to 
phare  in  the  inflation  of  prices  that  fol- 
lows depreciation;  but  even  that  rob- 
bery of  wages  would  be  temporary.  As 
our  correspondent  says,  "We  are  not 
Mexico,  nor  China,  nor  Japan,"  and 
our  workingmen  could  not  for  many 
years  be  fooled  by  the  device  of  a  cheap 
dollar  to  take  away  half  their  wages — 
which  is  the  remarkable  recommenda- 
tion for  free  coinage  that  is  presented 
by  this  contributor! 

This  theory  of  cheap  production  to 
be  secured  by  free  coinage,  the  very 
essence  and  purpose  of  which  is  to 
raise  prices,  calls  for  one  little  Illus- 
tration. During  a  period  of  15  years 
the  United  States  had  a  cheap  dollar, 
ranging  in  gold  value  from  35  to  90 


48 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


cents,  and  for  the  greater  part  of  the 
time  standing  about  60  or  70  cents.  Did 
England,  from  1862  to  1878,  have  to 
cheapen  its  standard  to  correspond,  or 
close  factories  to  escape  the  competi- 
tion of  our  products?  The  fact  is,  as 
everyone  knows,  that  England,  having 
been  on  a  gold  basis  since  1816,  has, 
during  that  entire  period,  competed 
with  silver-using  countries  and  ex- 
panded her  trade.  It  is  also  a  singular 
fact  that  Germany  has  expanded  her 
foreign  trade  most  markedly  since  she 
demonetized  silver  and  adopted  the 
gold  standard. 

We  next  direct  attention  to  the  argu- 
ment of  "Silver,"  because  it  is  a  typi- 
cal example  of  the  free  silver  misstate- 
ments.  We  supposed  that  our  discus- 
sion had  carried  the  subject  beyond  the 
stage  when  the  statement  of  that  view 
was  possible;  but  since  it  has  come  into 
the  argument,  it  is  worth  while  to  take 
it  up  and  discuss  it.  "Silver"  starts 
with  the  assertion  that  the  entire 
amount  of  gold  produced  in  the  United 
States  annually  is  less  than  40  millions. 
It  really  was  47  millions  in  1895,  and 
bids  fair  to  be  very  much  more  this 
year;  but  that  detail  is  not  important, 
except  as  illustrating  the  usual  loose- 
ness of  the  free  silver  statements. 
Thence  "Silver"  proceeds  to  argue  that 
if  wage-workers  were  paid  in  gold  their 
wages  must  be  less  than  20  cents  per 
day! 

A  very  clear  method  of  testing  the 
validity  of  that  logic  is  to  turn  it 
around  on  itself.  The  commercial  val- 
ue of  the  production  of  silver  in  the 
United  States  last  year  was  $32,000,000, 
or  two-thirds  that  of  the  production  of 
gold.  Hence,  supposing  "Silver's"  de- 
duction to  be  correct — or,  rather,  to 
illustrate  its  remarkable  incorrectness 
— if  the  wage-workers  were  to  be  paid 
in  silver,  their  wages  could  not  be  over 
13  cents  a  day.  The  true  answer  to  all 
such  sophistry  is  contained  in  the  facts. 
During  the'  20  years  when  the  country 
was  on  the  gold  basis,  which  forms  the 
subject  at  issue,  the  average  daily 
wages  of  the  industrial  wage-workers 
of  the  United  States,  men,  women  and 


children,  are  shown  by  the  United  States 
census  to  have  risen  from  93  cents  to 
$1.55  per  day,  in  gold  value.  The  same 
test  of  the  actual  facts  knocks  all  the 
wind  out  of  the  succeeding  argument  of 
"Silver,"  that  there  is  one  kind  of 
money  for  the  producer  and  another  for 
the  bondholder.  The  laborer,  or  pro- 
ducer, is  paid  in  money  having  the 
value  of  gold  and  exchangeable  for  it, 
and  the  money  lender  is  paid  in  exact- 
ly the  same  kind  of  money.  In  nine 
cases  out  of  ten  the  "money-dealing 
class,"  to  use  "Silver's"  term,  is  paid  by 
checks,  while  in  equal  proportion  the 
wage-working  class  is  paid  by  circulat- 
ing notes  of  the  United  States.  If 
either  of  them  wish  to  convert  the 
money  paid  them  into  gold  they  can 
do  so,  but  the  class  that  gets  the  circu- 
lating notes  is  one  step  nearer  the  gold, 
in  the  process  of  conversion,  than  the 
class  that  gets  the  checks.  This  condi- 
tion in  which  the  wage-worker  gets  a 
dollar  that  is  just  as  good  as  gold,  and 
is  kept  so  by  the  legislation  of  the  Uni- 
ted States,  is  what  the  opponents  of 
free  coinage  wish  to  maintain,  and 
what  the  advocates  of  free  coinage  wish 
to  change. 

"Silver's"  further  assertion,  that  this 
country  is  compelled  to  pay  over  two 
hundred  millions  annually  in  gold  to 
foreign  bondholders,  is  also  another  il- 
lustration of  very  wild  assertion.  Some- 
one has  said  so  somewhere;  therefore, 
all  the  free  silver  men  echo  it  in  chorus. 
The  fact  is  that  the  sum  stated  by  "Sil- 
ver" as  what  the  country  has  to  send 
abroad  in  gold  for  a  single  purpose  each 
year  is  far  more  than  it  has  sent  abroad 
for  all  purposes  in  the  last  three  years. 
Its  average  annual  exportation  of  gold 
for  the  three  years  ending  June  30, 1895, 
was  $37,263,000,  or  about  one-sixth  of 
his  assertion.  But,  lest  this  may  be 
confining  the  figures  to  something 
which  "Silver"  did  not  mean— although 
his  statement  is  specifically  that  $200,- 
000,000  in  gold  must  be  sent  abroad  an- 
nually—let us  take  the  entire  balance 
of  merchandise  and  specie  movements 
for  those  three  years.  The  total  bal- 
ance of  merchandise,  gold  and  silver 


49 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


exports  in  that  period  was  $396,887,000, 
or  $132,296,000  annually.  Out  of  this 
we  paid  the  expenses  of  American  tour- 
ists abroad,  estimated  conservatively  at 
$50,000,000  per  year,  the  large  item  of 
foreign  purchases  which  do  not  get 
into  the  Government  reports,  and 
^hich,  though  unknown,  is  a  consider- 
able amount,  and  finally,  the  very  large 
amount  of  United  States  securities  for- 
merly held  abroad,  which  have  been 
sold  by  the  foreign  holders  and  re- 
turned to  this  country.  Everyone  who 
has  kept  up  with  the  current  of  affairs 
knows  that  the  last  three  or  four  years 
have  been  pre-eminently  those  in  which 
our  securities  have  been  coming  home. 
When  all  these  factors  are  allowed  for, 
it  will  be  doubtful  if  the  amount  paid 
to  foreign  bondholders  equaled  the  $37,- 
000,000  of  gold  actually  exported  an- 
nually. 

Since  this  point  has  been  brought  up, 
it  is  pertinent  to  interpose  a  little  evi- 
dence on  this  stock  bug-bear  of  the  free 
silver  school,  the  amount  of  debt  or  se- 
curities of  the  United  States  held 
abroad.  In  1876,  W.  L.  Fawcett,  a  sil- 
ver advocate,  who  took  care  to  found 
his  arguments  on  at  least  a  prima  facie 
basis  of  fact,  took  the  figures  of  Edward 
Young,  of  the  Bureau  of  Statistics, 
showing  a  total  amount  of  United  States 
securities  held  abroad  at  $1,350,0007000, 
and  by  corrections  increased  the 
amount  to  $1,500,000,000.  It  is  legiti- 
mate to  apply  exactly  the  same  method 
of  reasoning  which  he  used,  to  the  trade 
balances  since  1876,  and  see  what  their 
effect  is  on  the  foreign  holdings  of  our 
securities. 

During  the  19  years  from  1877  to  1895 
inclusive,  the  United  States  had  the  fol- 
lowing net  credit  balances  on  its  trade 
with  all  foreign  countries: 

Net  exports  of  mdse $2,156,000,000 

Net  exports  of  gold . .        22,000,000 

Net  exports  of  silver 256,000,000 


Total  $2,434,000,000 

In  those  19  years,  it  is  liberal  to  put 
the  invisible  balance  of  trade  at  $80,- 
000,000  per  year,  or  $1,520,000,000  for  the 


19  years.  That  would  indicate  that 
paying  interest  on  foreign  debt,  ex- 
penses of  tourists,  allowing  for  goods 
smuggled  into  the  country  and  freights 
on  imports  to  foreign  shipowners,  con- 
sumed that  amount  of  these  credit  bal- 
ances, leaving  $914,000,000,  which  could 
only  be  discharged  by  the  return  of  in- 
vestments held  abroad,  to  this  country. 
It  is  well-known  that  such  a  movement 
has  been  a  leading  feature  of  finance  at 
different  periods  in  those  years,  not- 
ably the  past  three  years.  It  is,  there- 
fore, a  statistical  estimate  that  the  hold- 
ing of  American  securities  has  been  re- 
duced in  the  past  20  years  to  between 
500  and  1,000  million  dollars,  and  that 
the  annual  interest  charge  on  that  por- 
tion of  it  that  is  interest-bearing,  is 
liberally  estimated  when  it  is  put  above 
$30,000,000. 

The  question  which  Mr.  M —  — '-  pro- 
pounds, why,  in  1890,  when  it  seemed  as 
if  a  free  coinage  bill  would  pass,  the 
price  of  silver  rose  from  94c  to  $1.20,  has 
been  asked  before,  perhaps  by  the  same 
contributor;  but  as  it  did  not  bear  on 
any  vital  point  of  the  discussion,  we  did 
not  deem  it  necessary  to  stir  up  that 
scandal  of  the  silver  agitation.  Since 
Mr.  M —  —  insists  on  it,  however,  we 
will  say  that  while  we  have  not  at  hand 
the  daily  quotations  of  silver  for  that 
year  to  compare  with  his  figures,  it  is 
a  well  known  fact  that  there  was  a 
temporary  rise  in  silver,  concurrently 
with  the  agitation  prior  to  the  passage 
of  the  act  of  1890,  followed  by  a  corre- 
sponding slump.  It  is  an  equally  well 
known  fact  that  the  rise  was  produced 
by  the  manipulations  of  a  clique  of 
speculators,  who  got  control  of  the  sil- 
ver immediately  attainable  in  the  chief 
markets,  and  marked  up  the  nominal 
price.  This  fact  was  brought  to  the 
public  by  the  investigation  into  the  con- 
nection of  a  Senatorial  advocate  of  free 
silver  with  the  silver  clique,  and  his 
practical  confession  that  he  had  been 
speculating  in  the  price  of  an  article 
that  might  be  affected  by  his  vote.  It 
is  also  very  well  known  that  after  the 
chief  manipulators  had  realized  their 
purpose,  they  sold  out  and  let  the 


50 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


smaller  fry  pocket  the  losses,  as  is  usu- 
al in  such  operations.  Since  Mr. 
M —  — 's  imperative  demand  for  an 
answer  to  this  question  implies  a  be- 
lief that  the  Government  demand  can 
raise  the  price  of  silver  to  par  with 
gold,  he  might  undertake  to  explain 
the  fact  that  after  the  United  States  had 
started  out  in  1890  to  buy  all  the  silver 
produced  in  the  United  States,  the  price 
dropped  from  the  level  which  he  states, 
at  $1.20,  to  an  average  of  72  cents,  for 
1893,  up  to  July  1. 

We  think  that  no  one  will  deny  that 
The  Dispatch  has  been  liberal  in  an- 
swering the  questions  that  have  been 
submitted  to  it.  It  now  proposes  to 
claim  something  in  return  by  propound- 
ing to  the  free  silver  advocates  a  ques- 
tion for  their  decision.  They  claim  that 
an  appreciation  has  taken  place  by  rea- 
son of  the  act  of  1873,  of  100  per  cent  in 
the  purchasing  power  of  gold.  The  Dis- 
patch concedes  that  there  may  have 
been  10  per  cent  appreciation,  while 
the  gold  standard  men  deny  that  there 
has  been  any  appreciation  at  all. 

Now,  whether  the  appreciation  has 
been  100  per  cent  or  10  per  cent,  or  any 
intermediate  proportion,  when  did  it 
take  place?  Did  the  alleged  act  of 
striking  out  half  of  the  money  of  the 
world  at  once  double  the  value  of  gold? 
Or  has  the  stock  of  money  been  gradu- 
ally discovering  its  depletion,  so  that 
the  rise  in  gold  has  taken  place  grad- 
ually, a  small  percentage  in  each  year? 
If  the  value  of  gold  jumped  all  at  once, 
when  did  it  jump  ?  If  the  rise  has  been 
spread  over  a  great  many  years,  when 
did  the  rise  begin,  and  when  did  it 
end? 

*    *    * 

XII.— "Wages   and    Farming. 

A  communication  from  one  of  our 
free  silver  disputants,  bitterly  criti- 
cises The  Dispatch  for  taking  the 
wages  of  the  4,712,000  employes  in  the 
manufacturing  establishments  of  the 
United  States  as  evidence  that  wages 
have  increased.  He  criticises  this 
course  by  saying  that  there  are  22,735,- 
000  people  in  various  occupations  in  the 
country,  and  intimates  that  the  earn- 


ings of  the  other  18,000,000  would  show 
no  such  advance.  This  he  especially 
enlarges  on  in  the  case  of  the  farming 
population.  The  point  is  important 
enough  to  deserve  some  attention. 

The  wages  of  the  industrial  employes 
of  the  country  were  taken  as  an  ex- 
ample because  they  are  the  single  class 
in  which  there  are  complete  and  au- 
thoritative statistics,  as  to  the  actual 
payment,  not  of  nominal  wages,  but  of 
money  paid  to  the  workmen,  in  the 
years  compared.  The  statement  of 
some  disputants  that  the  increase  from 
1870  to  1890  does  not  take  into  consid- 
eration the  time  of  idleness  is  a  direct 
error.  The  showing  is  by  taking  the 
total  amount  actually  paid  in  wages  and 
dividing  it  by  the  gross  number  of  em- 
ployes, showing  the  average  actual  pay- 
ment of  wages  per  employe  to  have 
been  $484  in  1879,  against  $306  in  1869. 

While  the  number  of  workingmen 
covered  by  these  statistics  is  less  than 
a  quarter  of  the  population  engaged  in 
all  occupations,  it  is  about  one-third 
of  those  who  can  be  classified  as  wage- 
earners.  No  reasonable  man  will  un- 
dertake to  affirm  that  the  wages  of  4,- 
712,000  workingmen  in  mills  and  fac- 
tories could  rise  while  the  wages  of 
workingmen  outside  those  establish- 
ments were  declining.  It  is  a  well- 
known  fact  that  the  wages  of  the  3,325,- 
000  employes  in  trade  and  transporta- 
tion, and  of  the  4,360,000  persons  in  do- 
mestic and  personal  service,  have  kept 
pace  with  the  industrial  wages.  The 
wages  of  coal  miners  have  not  ad- 
vanced as  a  general  rule,  although,  if 
the  gold  value  of  miners'  wages  from 
1870  to  1873  were  compared  with  those 
of  1890  to  1892,  they  would  be  shown  to 
be  nearly  the  same.  It  is  just,  there- 
fore, to  take  industrial  wages  as  an  in- 
dex of  the  whole,  and  a  complete  dis- 
proof of  the  free  silver  assertion  that 
during  the  20  years  of  demonetization 
the  producing  classes  were  oppressed. 

It  should  be  understood,  too,  that 
these  figures  show  the  progress  dur- 
ing the  period  from  1870  to  1890.  These 
are  the  dates  for  which  the  census  gives 
the  statistics.  It  is  well  known  that 


51 


A  S 


the  same  conditions  prevailed  up  to  the 
close  of  1892.  After  that  there  has  been 
a  marked  change.  With  the  era  of 
meddling  with  the  tariff,  of  disturbed 
confidence  and  the  impending  threat  to 
disturb  the  currency,  there  has  been 
prostration  of  industry  and  decline  in 
wages,  although  it  may  be  doubted 
whether  they  are  yet  down  to  the  level 
of  1860.  In  this  fact  is  the  most  com- 
plete disproof  of  the  stock  free  silver 
argument.  Twenty  years  of  alleged  de- 
monetization brought  prosperity  and 
rising  wages.  Three  years  of  disturb- 
ance and  unsettled  confidence  have 
brought  prostration  and  falling  wages. 
Does  anyone  need  more  convincing 
proof  that  the  policy  which  the  Demo- 
cratic candidate  represents  is  the  one 
which  industry  should  suppress? 

Especial  mention  is  made  of  the  con- 
dition of  agriculture.  This  does,  be- 
yond question,  afford  some  marked  ex- 
ceptions to  the  general  rule  of  pros- 
perity from  1873  to  1893.  But  when  this 
industry  is  examined  statistically  it 
shows  decided  proof  that  the  free  sil- 
verite  claim  of  oppression  by  the  gold 
standard  is  absolutely  without  founda- 
tion It  is  well  known  that  wages  in 
the  agricultural  industry  have  not  de- 
clined, as  one  of  the  chief  and  notorious 
troubles  of  the  farmers  is  in  the  ina- 
bility to  procure  good  labor  and  the 
high  wages  that  have  to  be  paid. 

It  is  true,  however,  that  the  great 
mass  of  the  farmers  furnish  their  own 
labor,  and  the  results  of  their  labor 
must  be  learned  from  the  statistics  of 
crops  and  prices.  From  these  statis- 
tics, we  learn  the  entire  error  of  the 
necessary  assertion  that  the  depression 
in  farming  began  in  1873.  On  the  con- 
trary, it  was  expanding,  and  reached 
its  greatest  prosperity  many  years  after 
that  date. 

This  is  shown  most  clearly  by  taking 
the  total  values  of  crops  and  farm  ani- 
mals in  1873,  together  with  the  value 
per  acre  and  per  head,  respectively, 
and  comparing  them  with  the  year  of 
greatest  value  for  each.  The  following 
table  states,  first,  the  value  of  each  sta- 
ple product  in  millions,  and  the  value 


per  acre  (or  per  head  for  farm  animals) 
in  1873,  and  compares  them  with  the 
year  of  greatest  yield  in  value,  as  indi- 
cated in  the  last  column: 


1873— 

Year  Greatest 

Value 

Return 

^ 

^ 

•4 

^* 

h< 

3  £• 

B. 

ft 

§ 

ARTICLES 

§""0 

g 

|l 

o« 

g 

•o 

3 

<s 

1  3 

ft 

Mi0 

p 

Sj, 

5 

f 

Corn 

$391 
283 
10 

89 

$9  98 
12  78 
8  79 
9  18 

$  836 
513 
19 
232 

$10  98 
12  86 
10  80 
9  08 

1891 

1891 
1882 
1891 

Wheat  .. 

Rye 

Oats   

Barley    

26 

18  51 

37 

12  57 

1888 

Buckwheat  

5 

12  29 

7 

8  36 

1888 

Morses  

598 

65  10 

1007 

57  15 

1892 

Milch  cows  

275 

26  25 

423 

31  37 

1884 

Beef  cattle  

288 

17  57 

694 

23  26 

1885 

Sheep 

85 

2  59 

125 

2  67 

1893 

Swine  

117 

3  59 

295 

6  42 

1893 

The  yields  of  cotton  and  tobacco  are 
not  given  for  1873  in  the  Statistical  Ab- 
stract. The  largest  yields  given  for 
cotton  are  $309,000,000,  in  1882,  and 
$292,000,000,  in  1888,  the  value  of  yield 
per  acre  being  about  16  per  cent  less  in 
1888  than  in  1882.  Of  tobacco,  the  larg- 
est yields  in  value  given  are  $43,372,000 
in  1881,  and  $43,666,000  in  1888,  the 
acreage  being  one-sixth  larger  in  the 
latter  year. 

In  the  above  table  it  is  made  clear 
that  of  the  great  agricultural  staples, 
constituting  $2,167,000,000  of  the  farm 
products  in  1873,  the  period  of  increase 
extended  far  past  that  year.  In  one 
case  only,  that  of  rye,  was  the  period 
of  greatest  yield  in  value  as  early  as 
1882,  while  the  greatest  yields  of  corn, 
wheat  and  oats,  in  value,  were  in  1891. 
la  only  two  cases  was  the  value  of  the 
yield  per  acre  materially  diminished  in 
the  years  when  the  total  value  was 
greatest,  and  these  were  the  unimport- 
ant ones  of  barley  and  buckwheat.  The 
total  value  of  horses,  sheep  and  swine 
increased,  and  the  value  per  head  in- 
creased also,  up  to  l&s^,  and  1893.  Cat- 
tle reached  their  maximum  in  1884  and 
1885,  the  value  per  head  increasing  also, 
until  in  that  period  the  influences  of 
the  Western  cattle  ranges  brought 
down  the  price.  Sheep  were  worth 
more  per  head  in  1893  than  they  were 


52 


A  SILVER 


in  1873,  and  the  cause  which  has  re- 
duced their  value  since  then  is  well 
known.  These  figures  fully  support  the 
assertion  that  for  15  to  20  years  after 
the  alleged  demonetization  the  condi- 
tioiTof  agriculture  was  prosperous  and 
expanding,  and  that  since  then  the  in- 
crease of  production,  especially  in  lead- 
ing staples,  where  large  foreign  fields 
have  come  into  competition,  has 
brought  prices  down,  and  made  pro- 
duction on  some  of  them  unprofitable. 

This  fact  appears  very  clearly  in  the 
prices  of  leading  agricultural  staples 
taken  from  the  United  States  Statisti- 
cal Abstract,  in  a  previous  article.  In 
the  following  table  we  have  taken  the 
average  prices  for  the  three  years  1871- 
4,  as  par,  and  compared  them  with 
the  three  years,  1890-2,  and  the  suc- 
ceeding three  years,  1893-5.  The  fig- 
ures quoted  therefore  show  the  percent- 
age on  each  staple,  of  the  average  gold 
price  at  the  period  of  the  alleged  de- 
monetization: 

1890-2.  1893-5. 

Wheat 73        49 

Rye 80        70 

Oats 100        78 

Cotton 52        43 

Ohio  wools 58        45 

Corn 104        87 

Mess   pork 83      105 

Bacon  and  hams 93      108 

Salt  beef 81        81 

Butter 83        97 

Eggs 81        94 

Horses 101        flO 

Mules 104        70 

Milch  cows 83        75 

Sheep 100        81 

Swine 122      121 

Average 87        79 

On  these  16  leading  agricultural  sta- 
ples, the  average  decline  of  the  past 
three  years  is  at  a  rate  nearly  four 
times  as  great  per  year  as  the  decline 
for  the  preceding  18  years.  But  that 
fact  is  no  more  instructive  than  some 
others  which  appear.  There  are  certain 
staples  which  have  been  subjected  to 
well-known  causes,  entirely  outside  of 
the  monetary  question.  The  farmer. 


who  is  urged  to  relieve  his  position  by 
voting  for  free  silver,  should  ask  these 
questions: 

The  price  of  oats,  horses  and  mules 
was  as  great  or  greater  after  18  years 
of  demonetization,  but  then  they  drop- 
ped 30  to  40  per  cent.  Would  free  sil- 
ver have  prevented  the  development 
of  the  trolley  and  bicycle? 

Sheep  were  worth  as  much  in  1890-2 
as  in  1871-4.  Will  the  Democratic  free 
trade  candidate  restore  the  tariff  on 
wool? 

Wheat  and  cotton  show  the  most 
ruinous  decline.  Would  free  silver  have 
prevented  the  opening  of  170,000,000 
additional  acres  of  improved  land  in 
this  country,  and  of  illimitable  fields 
in  Russia,  Egypt,  India  and  the  Argen- 
tine Republic?  And  what  difference 
will  it  make  in  the  value  of  wheat  and 
cotton  to  make  a  cheaper  silver  dollar 
when  the  price  will  be  fixed  by  the  same 
gold  value  in  Liverpool? 

Finally,  when  the  staples  affected  by 
special  and  well-known  causes  are  tak- 
en out,  the  average  decline  in  the  11  re- 
maining cases, was  6  per  cent  in  18 years 
and  has  since  been  5  per  cent  in  three 
years.  Does  not  this  show  that  the  far- 
mers need  settled  confidence  and  gen- 
eral consumption  more  than  further 
legislative  interference  with  business? 

The  farmer's  position  presents  many 
problems,  and  same  especial  hardships. 
But  if  the  facts  are  fairly  understood, 
they  show  clearly  that  the  monetary 
question  has  little  to  do  with  it,  and 
that  the  free  silver  remedy  is  the  most 
arrant  quackery. 

*    *    * 

XIII.— Standard  and  Interest. 

In  a  communication  which  does  not 
appear  in  our  silver  debate  because  the 
writer  requests  that  it  be  withheld  for 
the  present,  on  account  of  an  erroneous 
statement  in  connection  with  another 
matter  than  the  one  to  which  we  refer, 
The  Dispatch  is  asked  whether  the  10 
or  15  per  cent  advance  in  gold,  which 
The  Dispatch  concedes  as  having  taken 
place  since  1873,  does  not  indicate  that 
the  system  which  works  such  a  result 
is  radically  wrong.  The  inquiry  is  so 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


cogent  to  a  point  not  yet  taken  up  that 
we  quote  it  as  an  introduction. 

Any  intentional  or  deliberate  change 
in  the  standard  is  radically  wrong.  If 
the  act,  commonly  described  as  that  of 
1873,  had  been  for  the  purpose  of  rais- 
ing the  standard,  as  falsely  charged, 
the  description  of  it  as  a  crime  would 
be  correct.  If,  in  1897,  other  changes 
should  be  made  for  the  express  and 
avowed  purpose  of  lowering  the  stan- 
dard, it  would  be  equally  a  crime.  The 
standard,  whether  of  weights,  or  meas- 
ures, or  values,  cannot  be  shifted 
without  injustice.  To  add  to  or  sub- 
tract from  the  pound  weight  or  foot 
rule  with  the  plain  purpose  of  changing 
the  amount  to  be  measured  is  dishonest. 

But  monetary  science  has  not  yet  dis- 
covered any  way  of  guarding  against 
fluctuations  of  the  standard.  No  one 
can,  therefore,  be  charged  with  the  re- 
sult of  increase  or  decrease  in  the  pro- 
duction of  monetary  metals  any  more 
than  with  the  increase  in  the  output  of 
Bessemer  steel.  While  we  have  shown 
that  the  assertion  of  a  conspiracy 
against  silver  in  1873,  to  serve  the 
money  lords,  is  a  stupid  slander,  we 
have  at  the  same  time  expressed  our 
opinion  that  the  acts  of  the  few  Euro- 
pean governments  which  started  into 
it  was  an  error.  But  with  regard  to 
that  error,  two  points  are  very  plainly 
shown  in  the  history  of  the  case,  which 
has  been  gone  over  at  length. 

First— The  United  States,  which  it  is 
proposed  shall,  all  by  itself,  rectify  that 
error,  had  no  responsibility  for  it.  It 
did  not  demonetize  anything  in  1873 
that  was  in  circulation.  It  has  not 
struck  silver  down,  because  since  1873 
it  has  done  just  17  times  as  much  per 
annum  to  keep  silver  in  monetary  use 
as  it  ever  did  before.  And  the  fact  that 
having  done  so  the  decline  of  si\ver  has 
kept  on,  shows  the  utter  emptiness  of 
the  idea  that  the  United  States  can  by 
itself  adopt  silver  without  the  deprecia- 
tion of  its  own  money. 

Second — The  correction  of  the  error 
which  may  thus  be  recognized  as  hav- 
ing been  made,  by  the  leadership  of 
Germany,  must  be  affected  by  interna- 


tional action.  A  large  and  powerful 
party  in  Germany  is  advocating  such  in- 
ternational action,  and  its  leader,  Dr. 
Otto  Arendt,  a  month  ago  published  a 
strong  article  showing  the  progress  of 
the  movement,  and  beseeching  the 
United  States  not  to  obstruct  it  by  go- 
ing into  silver  monometallism  under 
the  premature  action  advocated  by  the 
free  silver  men. 

jEarly  in  the  discussion  of  the  alleged 
advance  in  gold,  The  Dispatch  said  that 
even  a  10  per  cent  advance  would  be  a 
burden  on  productive  industry  if  it 
were  not  offset  by  compensatory  gains. 
We  desire  now  to  call  attention  to  one 
of  those  compensatory  gains. 

What  was  the  rate  of  interest  in  1873  ? 
Government  bonds  then,  as  now,  bore 
the  lowest  rate  in  the  country,  and  in 
1873  the  Government  could  hardly  sell 
a  5  per  cent  bond,  the  majority  of  its 
outstanding  issues  being  6  per  cent. 
Commercial  rates  of  interest  were  then 
8  to  10  per  cent.  The  city  of  Pittsburg 
sold  millions  of  bonds  in  1875  to  1877 
at  7  per  cent,  and  did  not  get  any  pre- 
mium for  them.  Mortgage  rates  ranged 
from  7  to  9  per  cent.  How  it  is  now? 

The  great  monetary  fact  of  the  period 
which  the  silver  men  allege  to  have 
given  the  evil  money  lender  all  the 
products  of  industry  has  been  a  sweep- 
ing and  universal  decline  in  interest 
rates.  The  Government  rate  before 
Democratic  muddling  and  Populist  ac- 
tivity shook  the  high  credit  of  the  Uni- 
ted States,  was  2  per  cent,  $25,000,000 
having  been  funded  at  that  rate  in  1891. 
The  writer  was  a  commercial  borrower 
in  1873,  and  paid  9  to  12  per  cent  in- 
terest; he  was  a  commercial  borrower 
in  1893,  and  paid  6  per  cent  interest. 
The  city  of  Pittsburg  sold  bonds  at  7 
per  cent  at  the  opening  of  this  period, 
and  sold  its  4  per  cent  bonds  at  the 
close  at  a  premium  which  made  the  rate 
about  3*&  per  cent.  Money  is  seeking 
mortgages  to-day  at  4^  to  5  per  cent, 
if  the  doubt  as  to  the  standard  is  re- 
moved, and  so  on  through  the  entire 
list,  showing  a  decline  of  from  two- 
thirds  the  interest  rate  on  Governments 


54' 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


to  one-third  on  the  more  common  class 
of  mortgages. 

This  is  not  a  mere  happening.  The 
reduction  of  interest  is  the  result,  first, 
of  maintaining  public  credit  by  scrup- 
ulous measures,  and,  second,  of  mak- 
ing the  standard  as  inviolable  and  un- 
fluctuating as  humanly  possible.  While 
the  effect  of  improved  prosperity, 
creating  loanable  capital,  first-class 
public  credit  and  a  sound  basis  is  the 
chief  cause  of  this,  it  is  also  true  that 
if  there  has  been  an  appreciation  in 
the  standard  it  has  acted  as  a  cause  of 
reduction  in  the  interest  rate  corre- 
sponding to  it.  Interest  is  fixed  by  nat- 
ural law  as  fully  as  anything  else;  and 
if  we  may  suppose  that — which  ought 
not,  and  probably  never  will,  take 
place — an  appreciation  in  the  standard 
should  be  arranged  and  clearly  fore- 
known, equal  to  the  annual  payment 
of  6  per  cent,  6  per  cent  securities 
would  command  money  on  terms  which 
would  practically  equal  the  payment 
of  no  interest  at  all. 

This  may  be  pursuing  the  subject 
into  a  detail  of  analysis  that  is  some- 
what difficult  of  demonstration;  but  on 
the  process  that  has  taken  place  since 
1873,  there  is  no  possible  question. 
From  1878  to  1881  the  United  States 
was  refunding  6  per  cent  bonds  at  3^ 
per  cent,  making  a  gain  of  2%  per  cent 
in  annual  interest.  Supposing  that  the 
entire  16  per  cent  in  the  fall  of  prices 
shown  in  Soetbeer's  tables,  was  due 
to  the  appreciation  of  gold — which,  as 
examination  has  already  shown,  is  not 
the  case — but,  taking  that  for  the  sake 
of  the  argument,  and  agreeing  that 
this  was  extended  over  the  whole  per- 
iod as  affirmed  by  a  silver  advocate.  In 
that  case,  the  United  States,  up  to  1880, 
had  suffered  an  appreciation  of  about 
5  per  cent  on  the  6  per  cent  issues 
which  it  had  refunded  that  year;  but 
since  then  it  has  gained  2y2  per  cent 
each  year  by  the  fall  in  interest  rates, 
or  on  the  16  years  since  then,  a  gain  of 
40  per  cent,  to  offset  the  supposed  loss 
of  16  per  cent  by  the  appreciation  of 
the  standard,  and  an  actual  one  of  prob- 
ably 10  per  cent.  This  gain  to  the  bor- 


rower extends  to  all  classes.  The  man 
who  borrowed  money  on  mortgage  10 
years  ago  has  suffered  in  the  10  years, 
supposedly  8  per  cent  by  appreciation  of 
the  standard;  but  he  has  gained  20  to 
30  per  cent  by  the  decline  in  interest 
rates  as  compared  with  1873. 

This  fact  is  worth  setting  down  as  one 
of  the  vital  factors  both  as  regards  the 
past  and  with  a  view  to  its  bearing  on 
the  future.  With  public  credit  sus- 
tained, and  the  stability  of  the  standard 
zealously  guarded,  the  position  of  the 
borrower  is  immensely  improved. 
*  *  * 

XIV.— A   Consideration   of   Jnstiee. 

We  have  in  previous  articles  ex- 
amined at  length  the  issues  of  fact 
involved  in  the  claim  that  as  gold  has 
appreciated  the  amount  of  debt  has 
appreciated  with  it,  and  therefore 
should  be  scaled  down  to  make  things 
even.  We  have  shown  that  when  the 
cloud  of  assertions  made  by  the  free 
silverites  is  subjected  to  the  test  of  ac- 
tual facts,  they  appear  in  their  true 
character  as  a  mass  composed  mainly  of 
fabrication  with  a  proportion  of  exag- 
geration. There  is  another  question  as 
to  the  remedy  which  they  propose  for 
an  evil  which  has  little  if  any  exis- 
tence. It  can  be  introduced  by  the  fol- 
lowing question: 

In  the  free  silver  plan  of  reducing  the 
standard  of  value,  on  account  of  the  im- 
aginary appreciation  of  debts  during 
the  past  23  years,  what  do  the  free  sil- 
ver men  propose  to  do  with  the  debts 
that  were  contracted  last  month? 

The  Dispatch  some  days  ago  asked 
the  free  silver  men  to  state  whether 
the  appreciation  of  gold,  on  which  they 
base  their  argument,  took  place  im- 
mediately after  the  fiat  "crime  of  1873," 
or  whether  it  has  been  extended  over 
the  entire  period  since  then.  One  of 
them  only  has  answered  the  question, 
and  he  says  it  has  been  going  on  grad- 
ually a  little  each  year.  If  half  the 
supply  of  wheat,  or  half  the  stock  of 
any  other  commodity  is  wiped  out,  the 
appreciation  of  price  due  to  it  would 
take  place  within  six  months.  But  as 
it  suits  the  argument  of  the  free  silver 


55 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


men  to  take  the  horn  of  the  dilemma 
which  makes  them  assert  that  an  im- 
aginary halving  of  the  stock  of  money 
23  years  ago  is  still  at  work  enhancing 
the  value  of  the  standard,  we  will  accept 
the  sole  answer  of  "Bimetallist"  as  the 
reply  of  the  whole  school. 

It  is  plain,  according  to  that  answer, 
that  a  loan  or  debt  made  last  month, 
or,  for  that  matter,  any  time  within  the 
past  10  years,  could  not  have  appreciat- 
ed all  that  is  claimed  for  the  apprecia- 
tion of  gold.  The  utmost  appreciation 
of  gold  shown  to  be  possible  by  scien- 
tific examination  of  the  fall  of  prices 
is  15  per  cent  in  20  years,  and  as  that 
showing  of  the  fall  of  prices  includes 
what  was  due  to  inventions  and  im- 
provements, the  actual  appreciation  of 
gold  must  be  much  less.  But  taking 
that  percentage  for  the  sake  of  the  ar- 
gument, we  find  that  in  the  case  of  debt 
contracted  during  the  last  10  years  the 
appreciation  of  gold  and  debt  has  been 
7%  per  cent.  That  is  also  offset  by  a 
decline  in  interest  rates  as  compared 
with  1873  of  1  to  2  per  cent  per  year, 
or  10  to  20  per  cent  for  the  10  years. 
With  such  a  state  of  facts,  the  proposi- 
tion to  scale  down  debts  40  to  50  per 
cent  takes  on  a  new  character  of  shal- 
low mischief-making,  when  we  per- 
ceive that  it  applies  equally  to  debts 
contracted  at  the  close  of  the  period, 
and  on  which  there  could  have  been  no 
calculable  appreciation  at  all. 

According  to  the  building  and  loan 
statistics  there  are  $5,471,500  paid  in  to 
the  building  and  loan  associations  each 
month.  That  amount  was  presumably 
paid  in  and  invested  in  mortgages  last 
month.  By  the  wildest  claims  of  the 
free  silver  apostles  this  has  appreciated 
less  than  one-third  of  one  per  cent.  By 
the  most  liberal  calculations,  taken  on 
the  basis  of  actual  fact,  it  has  not  ap- 
preciated one-thirtieth  of  one  per  cent. 
But  the  great  free  silver  idea  is,  be- 
cause there  was  an  imaginary  evil  in- 
flicted upon  the  debtor  of  23  years  ago, 
therefore  the  working  men  and  women 
who  saved  their  earnings  to  loan 
through  these  organizations,  are  to 


have  nearly  half  their  property  taken 
away  and  given  to  the  people  who  bor- 
rowed it  from  them.  The  borrowers 
got  the  full  gold  value  of  $5,400,000,  but 
because  gold  has  appreciated  in  the 
past  two  decades  they  are  to  have  the 
privilege  of  paying  back  a  little  over 
half  of  what  they  got. 

It  is  a  conservative  estimate  that  $3,- 
000,000  was  deposited  in  the  savings 
banks  of  the  country  last  month,  to  be 
invested  in  interest-bearing  securities, 
or  "moneyed  obligations,"  as  one  of  our 
free  silver  friends  puts  it.  What  a  trav- 
esty on  human  reason  it  is  to  propose 
that  because  the  savings  depositor  who 
had  his  money  there  in  1873  has  fat- 
tened to  the  alleged  extent  of  10  or  15 
per  cent,  in  appreciation  of  the  stand- 
ard, therefore  those  who  deposited  $3,- 
000,000  to  $4,000,000  last  month,  and  be- 
came members  of  the  hated  "money- 
lending  class,"  shall  be  forced  to  take 
back  less  than  half  of  the  value  de- 
posited! 

We  cannot  deem  it  possible  that  any 
sane  man  with  a  normal  sense  of  jus- 
tice, who  has  adyocated  the  free  silver 
idea,  can  have  reflected  on  the  mon- 
strosity of  such  a  proposition.  Yet,  as 
it  is  a  vital  part  of  the  problem,  we 
shall  expect  all  fair  and  honest  men  to 
recognize  the  following  inquiry  as  a 
crucial  one  in  the  judgment  of  the 
whole  subject. 

What  proportion  of  the  existing  debt 
in  the  United  States  has  been  subjected 
to  the  whole  or  the  greater  part  of  the 
alleged  appreciation  of  the  standard 
during  the  past  23  years? 

It  happens  that  there  is  very  exact 
information  on  some  of  the  leading 
classes  of  this  debt.  First  among  them 
we  will  take  the  two  examples  already 
referred  to.  The  building  and  loan  as- 
sociations constitute  one  of  the  largest 
in  number  of  this  obnoxious  "creditor" 
class.  There  are  5,838  of  them,  with 
1,745,000  members.  A  table  in  the  re- 
port of  the  United  States  Commissioner 
of  Labor  in  1893  showed  that  out  of 
5,819  of  them  reporting  their  age,  their 
different  ages  were  as  follows: 


56 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM 


Under  5  years 2,620 

Five  to  10  years 2,177 

Ten  to  15  years 589 

Fifteen  to  20  years 250 

Twenty  years  or  over 180 

In  other  words,  over  three-quarters 
were  put  in  operation  within  10  years 
before  the  date  of  the  report,  and  just 
about  3  per  cent  have  been  in  existence 
during  the  period  of  the  alleged  ap- 
preciation of  the  standard  during  which 
debts  were  paid.  It  is  well  known  that 
during  the  first  year  or  two  of  a  build- 
and  loan  association  its  total  receipts 
are  from  dues,  and  therefore  its  loans 
are  comparatively  small.  It  is  not  till 
the  third  or  fourth  year  of  such  an  as- 
sociation that  its  loans  attain  the  aver- 
age volume.  It  is  consequently  correct 
to  take  the  proportions  shown  above  as 
representing  the  duration  of  their  loans 
at  present.  The  free  silver  proposition 
is,  therefore,  that  because  of  an  imag- 
inary appreciation  during  23  years,  for 
which  time  less  than  3  per  cent  of  these 
associations  have  existed,  the  loans  of 
83  per  cent  of  them,  made  in  the  last 
ten  years,  and  amounting  to  $360,- 
000,000,  are  to  be  scaled  down! 

Savings  banks  depositors  are  the 
most  numerous  branch  of  the  creditor 
class  which  our  free  silver  friends 
consider  so  obnoxious.  We  have  not 
statistics  for  directly  estimating  the 
length  of  time  that  the  existing  sav- 
ings banks  deposits  have  stood.  We 
know  that  after  one  has  remained  un- 
touched for  20  years  it  is  treated  by 
law  as  an  unclaimed  deposit,  to  be  ad- 
vertised, and  we  also  know  that  the 
percentage  of  such  unclaimed  deposits 
to  the  total  is  very  small.  It  is  safe  to 
say  that  the  great  majority  of  savings 
bank  deposits  are  less  than  10  years  old. 
Yet,  whether  the  money  was  deposited 
10  years  ago,  or  this  year,  the  free  sil- 
ver proposition  of  scaling  down  debts 
proposes  to  fine  the  depositors  from 
one-third  to  one-half  their  savings,  on 
account  of  an  imaginary  "crime  of 
1873,"  and  an  alleged  appreciation  of 
the  standard,  which  however,  it  is  esti- 
mated must  have  taken  place  in  greater 
part  before  the  deposits  were  made. 


While  we  can  only  estimate  the  above 
factor  we  can  arrive  at  the  result  in  an- 
other way,  namely,  by  the  average  life 
of  the  investments  in  which  savings 
bank  deposits  are  mainly  put.  Two  of 
the  leading  classes  of  these  investments 
are  railroad  bonds  and  real  estate  mort- 
gages. The  two  constitute  about  two- 
thirds  of  the  estimated  total  of  all  debt 
in  the  United  States,  and  four-fifths  of 
the  debt  that  is  of  record^  There  are 
reliable  methods  of  determining  the 
duration  of  these  forms  of  debt. 

The  United  States  census  report  on 
real  estate  mortgages  shows  generally 
that  a  real  estate  mortgage  in  the  Uni- 
ted States  runs  from  five  to  seven  years. 
This  corresponds  with  the  statistics  of 
building  and  loan  associations  at  6.2 
years.  We  quote  from  the  census  re- 
port: 

"Of  the  mortgage  debt  in  force  in 
1880,  the  fully-paid  mortgages  that  are 
cancelled  on  the  records  are  72.03  per 
cent;  for  1889,  9.38  per  cent.  The  fully- 
paid  mortgages  not  cancelled  in  the  rec- 
ords are,  11.64  in  1880;  for  1889,  3.53  per 
cent.  The  partial  payments  on  mort- 
gages in  force  in  1880  are  2.21  per  cent; 
for  1889,  4.10  per  cent;  and  of  the  mort- 
gage debt  incurred  in  1880,  the  amount 
of  debt  in  force  under  the  surviving 
mortgages  is  14.12  per  cent;  for  1889, 
82.99  per  cent.  Nearly  all  the  debt  in 
force  in  these  counties  was  incurred 
during  the  last  10  years,  namely,  91.98 
per  cent;  while  75.33  per  cent  of  the 
mortgage  debt  m  force  was  incurred 
during  the  last  five  years.  A  small  por- 
tion of  the  existing  debt,  namely,  8.02 
per  cent  was  incurred  previous  to  1880. 
The  counties  where  there  is  any  per- 
ceptible surviving  mortgage  debt,  older 
than  20  years,  are  in  New  York,  New 
Jersey  and  New  England." 

If  this  does  not  satisfy  our  free  sil- 
ver friends  that  their  proposition  is 
to  fine  an  immense  amount  of  debt 
holders,  three-quarters  of  whom  lent 
their  money  within  the  last  five  years 
of  the  period  for  which  statistics  are 
available,  on  account  of  an  alleged  in- 
justice on  an  almost  inappreciable  pro- 


57 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


portion  of  the  whole,  they  can  obtain 
more  figures  from  the  same  source. 

We  have  in  our  possession  a  list  of 
railway  securities  comprising  over  3,000 
issues,  and  practically  covering  the  en- 
tire system  of  the  country.  The  rail- 
way bond  is  one  of  the  longest-lived  se- 
curities that  is  issued,  and  the  results 
as  shown  by  classifying  them  accord- 
ing to  their  date  will  be  the  most  fav- 
orable possible  for  this  free  silverite 
theory.  For  lack  of  time  to  go  through 
the  whole  3,000  or  more,  we  have  deem- 
ed it  sufficient  to  classify  the  200  com- 
ing first  in  alphabetical  order  and  com- 
prising such  old  companies  as  the  Bal- 
timore &  Ohio,  Boston  &  Albany,  Bos- 
ton &  L/owell,  Camden  &  Atlantic  and 
others.  The  proportion  of  them  issued 
within  the  periods  stated  below  is  im- 
portant. 

Per.  ct. 

1891  to  1895 24 

1886  to  1890 34 

1881  to  1886 18 

1876  to  1880 15 

Before  1876 9 

100 

In  other  words,  supposing  these  ra- 
tios to  hold  good  throughout  the  entire 
list,  the  free  silver  proposition  is  to 
scale  down  nearly  $1,500,000,000  of  rail- 
way bonds  which  have  been  in  exist- 
ence five  years  or  less,  and  nearly  $2,- 
000,000,000  outstanding  10  years  to  5 
years,  to  recompense  for  an  alleged 
appreciation  that  by  any  calculation 
must  have  occurred  mainly  before  this 
$3,500,000,000  was  issued!  And  the  pro- 
portion which  can  have  been  subjected 
to  the  whole  of  this  appreciation  is 
less  than  one-tenth  of  the  total  out- 
standing. 

The  debt  of  the  United  States  Gov- 
ernment is  one  of  the  chief  subjects  of 
complaint  by  the  advocates  of  a  re- 
duced standard.  The  fact  is  that  it-  is 
not  quite  one-twentieth  of  the  total 
debts  to  be  affected  by  that  stupendous 
proposition.  But  the  same  rule  that 
has  been  established  with  regard  to 
other  debts,  holds  good  with  regard  to 
Government  bonds.  For  while  the  ori- 


ginal debt  was  contracted  over  30  years 
ago  in  the  suppression  of  the  rebellion, 
three-quarters  of  that  original  debt  has 
been  paid  off,  and  all  the  issues  now 
outstanding— except  $1,674,500  bonds 
called,  but  not  presented  for  payment — 
were  issued  since  1873.  We  give  the 
date  at  which  each  issue  was  begun, 
with  the  amounts  outstanding: 

4's,  1877  and  1878 $559,631,750 

4's,  Refunding  certs.  77-78..  50,310 

2'3,  1891 25;364,500 

5's,  1894 100,000,000 

4's,  1895. 62,315,400 

4's,  1896 100,000,000 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  nearly  $300,- 
000  of  the  United  States  debt  has  been 
issued  since  1890.  With  regard  to  the 
whole,  the  table  brings  out  three  facts, 
of  which  the  cheap  money  school  ap- 
pt-ars  to  be  wholly  ignorant. 

First— Every  United  States  bond  out- 
standing in  1873  has  been  paid  or  re- 
funded since  then. 

Second— For  every  United  States 
bond  now  outstanding  the  Government 
received  gold  or  gold  values,  and  for 
a  large  share  of  them  gold  to  an  amount 
considerably  in  excess  of  the  face  value. 

Third — On  every  United  States  bond 
now  outstanding,  the  Government  has 
gained  by  the  reduction  in  the  interest 
rate  as  compared  with  that  of  1873,  two 
to  three  times  as  much  as  it  can  have 
lost  by  the  alleged  appreciation  of  gold. 

The  classes  of  debt  referred  to  above 
constitute  the  great  mass  of  securities 
running  over  a  term  of  years.  There 
are  in  addition  $228,000,000  State  debts, 
of  long  duration,  $724,000,000  of  munici- 
pal debt,  the  majority  of  comparatively 
recent  date,  and  about  $181,000,000  of 
county  and  school  debts  of  the  same 
class  as  to  duration.  But  the  $3,000,- 
000,000  of  bank  loans,  and  the  $1,300,- 
000,000  estimate  of  mercantile  and  pri- 
vate debts,  are  all  of  short  duration.  A 
mercantile  or  private  debt  that  has  run 
two  years  is,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten, 
a  bad  debt,  and  its  payment  will  not 
bother  the  debtor  at  all.  Bank  loans, 
on  the  average,  are  paid  off  every  60 
days,  and  a  bank  loan  that  is  over  two 


58 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


or  three  years  old  is  probably  in  good 
shape  to  be  charged  to  profit  and  loss. 
So  of  these  last  classes  of  debt,  now  ex- 
isting, there  is  absolutely  none  that 
has  been  subjected  to  the  whole  of  the 
alleged  appreciation  of  gold,  be  it  much 
or  little. 

These  facts  should  carry  their  own 
comment  on  the  proposition  to  scale 
down  debts  by  reducing  the  value  of  the 
dollar.  It  is  the  proposition  that  be- 
cause out  of  about  $15,000,000,000  of  debt 
statistically  ascertainable,  there  has 
beer,  just  about  $750,000,000  subjected 
to  the  whole  of  the  alleged  appreciation 
of  gold,  therefore  the  remaining  $14,- 
250,000,000  shall  be  scaled  down.  Of 
that  $15,000,000,000,  more  than  $11,000,- 
000,000  has  been  contracted  within  the 
past  10  years. 

Yet  the  free  silver  proposition  is 
to  scale  down  the  whole  muss,  to- 
grether  with  some  four  billions  of 
estimated  commercial  debts,  on  ac- 
count of  an  Imaginary  crime  of  1873, 
which  could  not  have  affected  4  per 
cent  of  the  total. 

Such  an  idea,  placed  side  by  side  with 
the  facts,  utterly  beggars  comment. 
None  is  needed  to  secure  its  proper 
characterization  by  any  mind  with  the 
faintest  conception  of  public  justice. 
*  *  » 

XV.— Sophistries   and  Prejudices. 

An  amusing  example  of  the  view 
which  the  typical  silver  disputant  takes 
of  everything  that  does  not  coincide 
with  his  predisposition  is  offered  by 
the  opening  sentence  of  the  communi- 
cation signed  "Silver."  "Your  reply  to 
my  article  of  June  29  seems  to  be  simp- 
ly an  evasion  of  the  real  question."  If 
anyone  will  take  the  trouble  to  com- 
pare the  former  contribution  of  "Sil- 
ver" with  the  reply  made  in  the  same 
issue,  he  will  see  that  if  the  real  ques- 
tion was  not  touched  it  was  because  the 
communication  of  "Silver"  did  not 
touch  it. 

That  contribution  first  produced  the 
remarkable,  though  by  no  means  un- 
precedented, argument  that  because 
the  annual  production  of  gold  in  the 


United  States  was  less  than  forty  mil- 
lions, therefore,  if  the  wage  workers 
were  to  be  paid  in  gold  their  wages 
must  be  reduced  to  less  than  20  cents 
a  day.  We  might  have  devoted  consid- 
erable space  to  the  foolishness  of  the 
assumption  that  the  stock  of  money  is 
no  more  than  the  annual  production  of 
the  United  States,  and  in  addition  to 
that,  the  idea  that  the  ability  to  pay 
wages  is  limited  by  the  stock  of  money, 
i.  e.,  that  a  manufacturing  city  having  a 
monetary  stock,  say  of  $500,000,  could 
only  pay  $500,000  wages  in  a  whole  year. 
But  it  was  sufficient  to  turn  the  argu- 
ment about  and  show  that  as  the  com- 
mercial value  of  the  silver  product  of 
the  United  States  is  two-thirds  that  of 
gold,  therefore,  according  to  our  corre- 
spondent's logic,  the  use  of  silver  must 
reduce  the  day's  wages  to  about  13  cents 
a  day.  In  addition  it  was  relevant, 
when  such  an  argument  was  introduced 
to  point  out,  as  we  did,  that  though  the 
production  of  gold  is  now  much  more 
than  stated  by  our  correspondent,  dur- 
ing the  period  when  the  production  of 
the  United  States  actually  was  less 
than  forty  millions,  the  average  day's 
wages  of  the  industrial  laborers  of  the 
United  States  advanced  from  93  cents 
to  $1.55.  The  same  communication,  go- 
ing on  to  assert  that  this  meant  one 
kind  of  money  for  the  workers  and  an- 
other kind  for  the  bondholders,  The 
Dispatch  simply  appealed  to  the  fact 
that  the  money  paid  to  the  wage  work- 
er is  just  as  good  as  that  paid  to  the 
bondholder,  and  the  effort  of  the  sound 
money  party  is  to  keep  it  so.  As  "Sil- 
ver" declared  that  this  was  "the  whole 
question  in  a  nutshell,"  it  was  certainly 
pertinent  to  show  that  the  fact  dis- 
proves his  assertion.  Finally,  "Silver" 
having  asserted  that  "the  country  is 
compelled  to  pay  foreign  bondholders 
over  $200,000,000  in  gold  annually," 
The  Dispatch  turned  to  the  statistics  of 
trade  and  specie  movements  to  show 
that  the  country  was  not  compelled  to 
do  anything  of  the  sort. 

In  other  words,  after  The  Dispatch 
has  squarely  replied  to  each  of  this 
writer's  assertions,  and  shown  their 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


error,  he  asserts  that  it  is  "an  evasion 
of  the  real  question,"  and  proceeds  to 
state  new  positions.  We  do  not  know 
any  way  to  discuss  this,  or  any  other 
question  intelligently  and  fairly  than  to 
take  the  arguments  or  assertions  that 
are  advanced  and  see  how  much  foun- 
dation they  have  in  actual  fact,  or  in 
logical  justice.  We  did  that  with  the 
first  communication  of  "Silver;"  we 
shall  continue  the  same  style  of  treat- 
ment with  his  second  effort. 

This  contributor  begins  again  by  as- 
suming that  "every  bond  issue  author- 
ized by  law  is  a  mortgage  upon  the 
productive  industry  of  the  country." 
This  is  an  indisputable  assumption; 
and  therefore  it  is  gratifying  to  note 
that  scrupulous  honesty  in  the  pay- 
ment of  such  debts  and  jealous  main- 
tenance of  a  stable  standard  have  re- 
duced the  burden  of  that  debt  in  the 
rate  of  interest  en  Government  bonds 
from  5.8  per  cent — the  average  rate  on 
the  Government  debt  prior  to  1873, — to 
2  per  cent,  which  represented  the  high 
water  mark  of  our  credit  when  Secre- 
tary Windom  funded  4%  per  cents  into 
2  per  cents,  in  1891. 

The  contribution  goes  on  to  assert 
that,  therefore,  "every  bushel  of  wheat, 
every  ton  of  iron  and  every  day's  wages 
is  tolled  or  taxed  to  buy  gold  for  the 
bondholder."  This  is  a  familiar  mis- 
statement  from  the  fiat  money  era.  When 
the  currency  of  the  country  was  of  less 
value  than  gold,  then  the  payment  of 
public  interest  in  gold  involved  a  cer- 
tain proportion  of  taxation  to  buy  the 
gold.  But  when  the  whole  currency  is 
as  good  as  gold,  no  one  is  taxed  to'  buy 
gold  for  the  bondholder.  The  taxation 
is  simply  to  pay  the  interest  on  the 
bonds,  and,  as  we  have  already  shown, 
that  taxation  has  been  immensely  de- 
creased by  the  reduction  in  the  rate  of 
interest. 

Our  correspondent  continues  to  re- 
sort to  the  stock  argument  that  by  lim- 
iting lawful  money  to  gold,  we  contract 
the  basis  of  commercial  credits,  and  ap- 
peal to  the  prejudice  against  "a  class 
that  simply  consumes  the  wages  of  the 


laborer."  As  to  the  contraction  of  thft 
basis,  it  is  pertinent  to  say  that  it  is 
not  contracted  as  much  as  it  would  be 
if  the  basis  were  restricted  to  silver 
alone,  which  is  the  inevitable  result 
of  free  coinage.  There  is  a  further  an- 
swer to  this  stock  argument  of  the  fiat 
money  rather  than  free  silver  class. 
Facts  are  important  things,  although 
our  opponents  are  wont  to  scorn  them, 
and  we  propose  to  inject  one  fact  right 
here.  If  legal  tenders  were  lawful 
money,  within  the  meaning  of  our  cor- 
respondent, we  had,  in  1878,  $346,000,- 
000  of  them.  If  he  refers  to  coin  alone, 
we  then  had  no  money  at  all.  We  have 
now,  of  various  classes  of  money,  some 
$600,000,000  of  gold,  $500,000,000  of  sil- 
ver, and  $700,000,000  of  paper  money. 
Our  correspondent  can  choose  out  of 
the  list  whatever  he  regards  as  "law- 
ful money,"  and  he  will  find  that,  in 
any  class  he  selects,  the  basis  has  not 
been  contracted,  but  greatly  enlarged. 

The  regulation  resort  of  this  class  of 
disputants  to  talk  about  "a  class  that 
does  not  add  a  dollar  to  the  wealth  of 
the  nation,"  does  not  deserve  much  at- 
tention, but  we  shall  give  it  all  it  de- 
serves by  pointing  out  who  constitute 
the  greater  number  of  the  obnoxioui 
class  that  have  saved  their  money  and 
lend  it  to  be  employed  in  productive  in- 
dustries. The  depositors  in  savings 
banks  form  the  greatest  number;  the 
members  of  building  and  loan  associa- 
tions the  next  greatest.  There  are  4,- 
800,000  of  the  former,  and  1,700,000  of 
the  latter.  To  assert  that  the  savings 
bank  depositor  or  building  and  loan 
member  who  has  saved  up  an  average  of 
about  $350,  and  lent  it  through  the  sav- 
ings bank  or  building  association  to 
other  people,  to  build  houses,  construct 
railways,  buy  machinery  or  carry  on 
any  of  the  vast  range  of  productive  in- 
dustries, does  not  add  a  dollar  to  the 
wealth  of  the  nation,  is  a  typical  ex- 
ample of  the  shallowness  of  this  attempt 
to  raise  class  prejudice.  It  is  a  well-  • 
known  fact  that  in  proportion  as  the 
accumulation  of  this  class  of  loanable 
funds  is  large,  and  the  conditions  stable 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


and  secure,  productive  industry  can  se- 
cure means  at  easy  rates. 

Our  correspondent  after  exhibiting 
these  typical  and  oft-refuted  sophistries 
asks  some  questions  which  we  are  quite 
willing  to  answer  seriatim.  First,  he 
wishes  to  know  what  did  the  productive 
industries  of  the  country  gain  by  the 
demonetization  of  silver  in  1873  ? 

To  this  we  will  reply  that  by  the  al- 
leged demonetization  of  1873,  consid- 
ered strictly  by  itself,  the  productive  in- 
dustries of  the  country  neither  gained 
nor  lost  anything  at  all.  That  act  did 
not  affect  them  in  the  slightest  degree, 
because  it  demonetized  nothing  but  a 
legal  notion.  It  did  not  take  from  the 
currency  a  single  coin  that  was  then  in 
circulation  or  had  been  in  monetary  use 
for  20  years  before.  But  from  the  mon- 
etary policy  of  payment  of  debt  and 
scrupulous  care  for  the  standard  that 
prevailed  for  the  greater  part  of  the 
period,  the  productive  industries  of  the 
country  gained  that  stability  and  confi- 
dence which  permitted  the  expansion  of 
its  total  wealth  from  $24,000,000,000 
(gold  value)  in  1870  to  $65,000,000,000  in 
1890. 

Next,  what  did  they  gain  by  the  re- 
peal of  the  Sherman  act  in  1893?  They 
gained  a  partial  restoration  of  confi- 
dence. When  the  other  disturbing 
cause,  the  tinkering  with  the  tariff,  was 
removed,  there  was  a  general  revival  of 
industry  during  last  year,  which  has 
been  set  back  by  the  uneasiness  caused 
by  the  free  silver  agitation. 

Next— "In  both  cases  there  were  pan- 
ics. Who  profited  by  the  panics?" 

Taking  the  direct  question  first,  no 
one  profited  by  the  panics  except  the 
speculators  and  manipulators  who 
would  reap  the  richest  harvest  if  the 
silver  men  could  have  their  way.  The 
lenders  of  money  on  commercial  paper, 
or  the  investors  in  bonds  and  mortgages 
did  not  profit  by  the  panics.  They  lost 
by  them. 

We  dispose  of  this  question  to  take  up 
the  inferential  assertion  in  the  state- 
men,  "in  both  cases  there  were  panics" 
that  the  panic  of  1873  was  caused  by 


the  demonetization  of  the  silver  dollar 
and  the  panic  of  1893  by  the  repeal  of 
the  Sherman  act.  This  is  a  recent  pro- 
duction of  free  silver  logic.  In  1873, 
when  the  conditions  of  panic  stared 
everyone  in  the  face,  no  one  ever 
thought  of  attributing  it  to  the  mint 
act.  Every  one  knew  it  was  due  en- 
tirely to  different  causes,  the  floating  of 
gigantic  bubbles  on  the  basis  of  no 
value.  But  22  years  later  it  occurred  to 
some  free  silver  sophist  that  it  would  be 
a  smart  thing  to  attribute  the  panic  of 
1873  to  the  mint  act  of  that  year  and 
the  panic  of  1893  to  the  repeal  of  the 
silver  purchase  clause.  We  propose  to 
let  the  light  in  on  that  cheap  deception 
by  putting  it  side  by  side  with  two  in- 
disputable facts. 

It  is  a  favorite  assertion  of  the  free 
silver  advocates  that  the  demonetiza- 
tion of  1873  was  surreptitiously  obtained 
and  that  the  people  did  not  find  it  out 
until  1875  or  1876.  According  to  their 
own  assertion,  therefore,  the  nation 
went  into  a  panic  on  account  of  an  act 
of  which  no  one  learned  until  two  years 
later.  It  is  hardly  less  ridiculous,  on 
the  basis  of  actual  fact,  to  assert  that 
a  panic  was  created  because  a  coin  had 
been  demonetized  of  which  there  were 
actually  none  in  circulation,  and  which, 
if  any  man  had  one,  would  have  sold  for 
12  per  cent  premium. 

The  assertion  that  the  panic  of  1893 
was  caused  by  the  repeal  of  the  silver 
purchase  clause  is  riddled  by  one  fact 
within  the  recollection  of  every  well-in- 
formed man.  That  is,  that  the  panic 
had  been  in  operation  for  months  before 
the  date  of  the  repeal,  and  terminated 
shortly  after  the  repeal. 

The  panic  of  1893  began  in  May  and 
reached  its  height  in  June  and  July. 
While  other  causes  aggravated  it,  it 
was  mainly  due  to  the  fear  that  the 
silver  purchase  act  would  bring  the 
nation  to  the  silver  basis.  The  panic 
had  been  a  recognized  fact  for  just 
about  five  months,  when  Congress,  on 
October  30,  repealed  the  silver  pur- 
chase clause.  It  was  not  60  days  after 
that,  before  money  became  more  abuu- 


61 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


dan't  in  New  York  than  had  ever  before 
been  known.  Business  prostration  con- 
tinued for  a  year  under  the  fear  of  tar- 
iff troubles;  but  the  monetary  panic  of 
1893  ended  with  the  repeal  of  the  silver 
purchase  provision.  After  this,  fur- 
ther intimations  about  the  panics  of 
1873  and  1893,  being  caused  by  the  sil- 
ver legislation  of  those  years,  will  be 
treated  as  the  cheap  invention  which 
they  are. 

Next,  "Silver"  asks:  "When  silver 
was  demonetized  by  European  coun- 
tries, was  the  condition  of  the  produc- 
tive average  class  improved?  We  have 
stated  heretofore  that  we  do  not  think 
it  was,  the  real  demonetization  having 
taken  place  in  Europe.  The  Dispatch, 
like  the  great  majority  of  the  sound 
money  men,  is  in  favor  of  the  policy  of 
co-operating  with  Europe  to1  restore  the 
use  of  silver  there.  But,  as  it  has 
shown  again  and  again,  the  United 
States  having  demonetized  no  silver  at 
all,  but  having,  on  the  contrary,  coined 
250  times  as  many  silver  dollars  per  an- 
num since  1873  as  before,  it  is  foolish 
to  assert  either  that  the  United  States 
is  responsible  for  it,  or  that  it  can,  by 
its  unaided  action,  rectify  a  mistake 
made  entirely  outside  its  jurisdiction. 

But  here  "Silver"  branches  off  into  a 
new  and  peculiar  freak  of  free  silver 
logic.  Is  not  the  proposition  to  have 
gold  so  as  to  be  on  an  even  footing 
with  Europe  a  policy  that  must  "of  ne- 
cessity drag  our  industries  down  to 
the  degraded  level  of  the  industries  of 
despotic  countries?"  It  is  turning  this 
logic  properly  upon  itself  to  inquire 
whether  industries  are  more  degraded 
in  England,  Germany,  Austria  and  the 
United  States,  all  on  the  gold  basis,  or 
in  India,  China,  Japan  and  Mexico  all 
on  the  silver  basis,  and  to  ask  whether 
it  will  not  "of  necessity"  drag  our  in- 
dustries down  to  the  degraded  level  of 
China  to  adopt  silver.  Of  equal  charac- 
ter is  the  question  whether  internation- 
al bimetallism  is  not  an  overwhelming 
argument  of  free  trade!  It  is  not  more 
so  than  the  question  whether  we  shall 
measure  by  pounds  and  yards,  derived 


from  England,  or  by  grammes  and 
metres  derived  from  France.  It  is  rath- 
er singular  that  such  a  failure  to  under- 
stand the  question  should  appear  at 
this  stage  of  the  discussion;  but  since  it 
has  appeared  we  will  state  the  primary 
consideration  at  the  base  of  the  whole 
question  of  coinage. 

What  gives  a  monetary  metal  its  value 
is  the  demand  of  the  world  for  its  use 
in  that  capacity.  If  the  whole  world 
wishes  to  take  gold,  the  value  of  gold 
is  established.  If  the  whole  world 
agrees  to  take  silver  at  the  same  time, 
there  is  reason  to  hope  that  the  value 
of  silver  will  be  approximately  estab- 
lished, side  by  side  with  gold,  and  the 
world's  stock  of  monetary  metals  cor- 
respondingly increased.  To  support  an 
international  movement  which  will 
make  monetary  values  stable  and  en- 
large the  basis  has  no  more  to  do  with 
free  trade  or  the  relative  conditions  of 
labor,  than  the  eleventh  proposition  of 
Euclid  has  with  the  first  declension  of 
Latin  grammar. 

This  contributor  closes  with  the 
statement  that  "we  want  a  financial 
policy  that  will  promote  industries." 
That  is  correct.  Therefore  it  would 
be  well  to  adhere  to  the  policy  that  in- 
creased the  wealth  of  the  country  be- 
tween 1870  and  1890  more  than  150  per 
cent;  that  quadrupled  in  the  same  per- 
iod the  capital  engaged  in  manufac- 
tures; that  increased  the  number  of 
people  employed  by  125  per  cent;  and 
enhanced  the  average  wages  of  each  in- 
dividual employe  by  60  per  cent;  and 
that  increased  the  total  industrial  out- 
put a  little  less  than  three  times. 

It  may  seem  that  we  have  devoted 
rather  too  much  space  to  showing  the 
emptiness  of  these  characteristic  free 
silver  sophistries;  but  as  they  compose 
the  style  of  logic  used  most  freely  to 
mislead  and  confuse  the  masses,  it  is 
worth  while  that  their  emptiness  and 
falsity  shall  be  thoroughly  ventilated. 

Among  the  communcations  of  our 
free  silver  friends,  that  signed  "G.  B.," 
deserves  attention  because  it  is  a  sin- 
cere statement  of  opinions  formed  un- 


62 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


der  misconceptions  of  the  real  facts, 
and  also  because  it  touches  up/m 
a  great  evil  which  the  writer  wrong- 
ly, though  sincerely,  thinks  is  con- 
nected with  the  question  of  coinage.  We 
will  try  to  make  the  error  of  his  argu- 
ment clear  in  as  short  space  as  possible. 
First,  he  objects  to  the  credit  system 
because,  as  he  thinks,  if  a  purchase  is 
made  and  credit  is  given  for  six  months, 
the  "money  must  be  earned  and  paid 
over  before  a  settlement  is  made.'  It 
is  true  that  money  or  money's  worth 
must  be  paid  over;  but  the  system  of 
banking  and  credit  makes  the  work  of 
payment  much  easier.  For  instance, 
suppose  half  a  dozen  men,  producing, 
say,  one  clothing,  another  shoes,  an- 
other flour,  another  meat,  another  gro- 
ceries, and  the  last  houses,  agree  to  fur- 
nish each  other  with  these  necessaries 
for  a  year,  to  keep  account  of  what  each 
has  furnished,  and  at  the  expiration  of 
the  period  to  settle  the  balance.  Dur- 
ing that  time  the  total  of  what  each 
has  furnished  the  others  may  be  $200 
each  or  $1,200  in  all.  One  may  owe  an- 
other $50  on  the  whole  trade,  the  latter 
may  owe  two  others  $25  each,  and  so  on 
around.  The  joint  credit  of  all  has  en- 
abled them  to  go  on  producing  and  ex- 
changing what  they  produced  for  what 
they  needed  to  consume,  and  $50  in 
cash  can  settle  the  whole  $1,200  in 
trade.  This  operation  multiplied  a 
thousand  times  and  expanded  to  take  in 
trade  not  only  between  cities  and  sec- 
tions, but  between  nations,  is  what  is 
effected  by  the  machinery  of  banks  and 
bank  credits.  But  in  the  expansion  two 
practical  facts  appear.  In  retail  trade, 
comprising  small  transactions  chiefly, 
it  is  generally  more  convenient  to  have 
transactions  settled  in  circulating 
money,  either  at  the  time  of  purchase 
or  at  stated  intervals.  In  the  operations 
of  wholesale  trade  or  manufacture  the 
system  of  bank  credits  is  tar  more  con- 
venient and  labor-savng.  A  man  in 
Pittsburg  has  $10,000  worth  of  coal  or 
iron  to  ship  to  Chicago.  It  being  ship- 
ped, it  is  a  practical  certainty  that  Chi- 
cago will  pay  for  it,  either  by  sending 


back  the  money  or  sending  back  meat 
or  flour  or  something  else  that  Pitts- 
burg  wants.  Perhaps  Chicago  may 
send  meat  or  flour  to  Duluth  to  feed  the 
iron  ore  miners,  and  the  iron  ore  mines 
will  send  ore  to  Pittsburg,  thus  paying 
at  once  Duluth's  debt  to  Chicago  and 
Chicago's  debt  to  Pittsburg.  The  whole 
system  of  banks  and  bank  credits,  in- 
finitely varied,  is  based  on  the  principle 
first,  that  when  a  manufacturer  or  deal- 
er sells  goods,  the  'trade  establishes  a 
practical  assurance  that  it  will  be  paid 
for  chiefly  in  goods,  but  possibly  in 
money,  and,  second,  that  the  exchange 
of  goods  enables  the  settlements  to  be 
made  with  much  less  trouble  than  if 
the  money  had  to  be  sent  to  each  trader 
and  each  city  for  each  transaction.  If 
money  were  so  plenty  that  every  mer- 
chant had  to  keep  a  warehouse  to  store 
it  in,  it  would  still  save  time  and  labor 
to  settle  these  accounts  by  checks  and 
drafts.  A  very  fair  illustration  of  this 
saving  is  afforded  by  the  fact  that  a 
score  of  bank  clerks  meet  every  day  in 
this  city  and  in  less  than  half  an  hour 
settle  from  $2,500,000  to  $3,000,000  of 
actual  payments.  Did  our  correspon- 
dent ever  stop  to  think  how  long  it 
would  take  these  clerks  or  others  to 
count  out  and  hand  over  $3,000,000  in 
coin  or  bills?  So  no  matter  how  much 
money  there  might  be,  the  system  of 
bank  credits  is  an  immense  labor-sav- 
ing device  without  which  trade  cannot 
be  carried  on  in  anything  like  its  pres- 
ent volume.  It  also  affords  the  produc- 
er who  may  not  happen  to  have  enough 
of  the  plethora  of  money  to  carry  on 
the  business  he  wants,  to  obtain  credit 
on  the  foundation  of  his  production. 

Now,  bearing  in  mind  the  accepted 
and  reliable  basis  of  bank  credits,  let 
us  examine  our  correspondent's  second 
objection  to  the  credit  system,  namely, 
that  under  it  the  great  manipulators 
of  Wall  street  can,  in  order  to  juggle 
stocks,  lock  up  money,  and  thus  dis- 
turb credits.  In  describing  this  evil 
he  has  touched  upon  one  of  the  great 
sources  of  unjust  concentration  of 
wealth.  The  manipulation  of  stocks, 


63 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


the  fleecing  of  the  public  by  favoritism 
ir>  rates,  the  wrecking  of  corporations 
by  inside  rings,  of  all  which,  such  an 
operation  as  our  correspondent  de- 
scribes is  part,  form  a  total  of  evil 
which  The  Dispatch  has  attacked  over 
and  over  again.  The  almost  maddening 
feature  of  the  case  is  that  the  people 
whose  duty  it  is  to  antagonize  such  evils 
fly  off,  as  our  correspondent  does  to  the 
idea  of  cheap  money,  which  has  abso- 
lutely nothing  to  do  with  these  evils 
of  speculative  manipulation,  corporate 
wrecking  and  favoritism,  except  to  ag- 
gravate them. 

Every  one  of  these  operations  can  be 
carried  on  just  as  well  with  a  free  sil- 
ver standard  as  with  a  gold  standard. 
They  have  been  carried  more  notorious- 
ly and  flagrantly  on  an  irredeemable 
paper  currency  than  on  the  gold  basis. 
The  sound  banking  interests  always 
prefer  mercantile  paper  made  by  the 
actual  sale  of  goods,  to  speculative  call 
loans,  and  it  is  only  when  there  is  more 
money  than  business  demands,  that 
there  is  an  abundance  of  it  in  New 
York  for  the  speculative  jugglers  to 
blow  bubbles  and  then  fleece  the  lambs 
by  bursting  them.  And  the  crowning 
stupidity  of  it  all  is  that  these  specula- 
tive manipulators  are  of  the  borrowing 
class.  The  Goulds,  Vanderbilts  and  Rock- 
fellers  began  their  careers  by  borrow- 
ing, and  as  stockholders  in  corporations 
which  they  manipulated  by  their  in- 
side position  still  occupy  the  position 
of  debtors  to  the  holders  of  the  railway 
mortgage  bonds.  And  the  free  silver 
idea  of  scaling  down  debts  is,  in  its 
greatest  example,  to  take  about  $3,000,- 
000,000  of  the  honest  value  of  these 
bonds  away  from  their  owners,  largely 
depositors  in  savings  banks  and  trust 
companies  and  insurance  policy  hold- 
ers, and  to  give  that  vast  sum  to  the 
stockholding  interest,  enhancing  the 
very  fortunes  whose  concentration  is 
one  of  the  dangerous  tendencies  of  the 
age! 

Mr.  R.  L.  W says  our  answer  to 

a  former  letter  is  not  "entirely  satis- 
factory" to  him.  That  so  mild  a  dissen- 


sion comes  from  our  silver  friends  is  so 
encouraging  that  we  will  endeavor  to 
correct  the  misapprehensions  into 
which  he  has  fallen.  He  first  quotes  us 
as  saying  that  "trade  fixes  the  amount 
of  money  in  circulation ;  legislation  can- 
not.' We  find  on  reference  to  our  files 
that  the  use  of  the  word  "can"  in  one 
sentence  of  our  reply  to  the  former  in- 
quiry permits  this  misconception  of  our 
meaning,  although  in  the  following  sen- 
tence the  words  that  the  needs  of  trade 
"should"  fix  the  volume  of  circulation 
might  have  corrected  it.  We  can  con- 
ceive of  a  government  so  despotic  and 
idiotic  as  to  enact  that  there  should  be 
only  two  pounds  of  flour  per  capita  in 
a  country,  and  we  might  also  conceive 
one  so  foolish  as  to  enact  that  for  every 
head  of  population  there  must  be  two 
tons  of  flour  stored  up.  Just  because 
there  are  such  possibilities  of  the  stu- 
pidity of  legislation  the  needs  of  trade 
alone  should  fix  the  volume  of  food, 
clothing  iron,  or  money  used  in  their 
exchange. 

Now,  with  regard  to  Mr.  W 's 

inquiries,  the  increase  of  silver  and  sil- 
ver certificates  has  been  a  portion  of 
the  increase  of  our  circulation  since 
1878;  but  what  preceded  it?  In  five 
years  after  1878  the  stock  of  gold  in- 
creased from  about  $75,000,000  in  the 
Treasury  and  on  the  Pacific  coast  to 
$540,000,000.  Our  critic's  inquiry  as  to 
whether  trad©  can  bring  gold  from  Eu- 
rope is  sufficiently  answered  by  the  fact 
that  it  did  in  those  years  bring  gold 
from  Europe  to  the  amount  of  about 
$300,000,000,  the  balance  of  the  increase 
being  made  up  of  domestic  production 
and  the  reappearance  of  gold  previously 
hoarded.  Our  correspondent's  further 
error  that  Great  Britain  makes  her  in- 
vestments in  the  United  States  by  sell- 
ing us  commodities  betrays  ignorance 
of  the  fact  that  we  sell  the  United  King- 
dom annually  $240,000,000  more  than  the 
United  Kingdom  sells  to  us;  that  in  the 
past  20  years  the  United  States  has  had 
a  balance  of  trade  with  the  whole  world 
in  its  favor  of  over  $2,400,000,000,  with 
which,  after  paying  the  invisible  bal- 


64 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


ances  of  trade,  it  has  brought  back  from 
Europe  between  500  and  1,000  mil- 
lions of  its  own  securities;  and  that  for 
the  18  years  prior  to  1895  the  net  gold 
movement  was  over  $6,000,000  in  its 
favor,  showing  that  except  what  was 
carried  abroad  in  the  pockets  of  tour- 
ists the  whole  gold  production  of  the 
United  States  during  those  18  years 
stayed  in  the  country.  In  1895  there 
was  a  net  export  of  $30,000,000  of  gold, 
so  that  subject  to  the  deduction  above 
stated,  the  United  States  has  in  20  years 
gained  in  its  stock  of  gold,  coined  and 
uncoined,  something  over  $600,000,000. 
Our  friend's  further  errors  may  be  seen 
in  the  reference  to  an  increase  in  na- 
tional bank  circulation,  the  fact  being 
that,  owing  to  various  causes,  among 
them  the  increase  of  other  forms  of  cir- 
culation, national  bank  notes  have  de- 
creased from  over  $400,000,000  in  1878 
to  about  $200,000,000  now;  while  his  sup- 
position that  the  banks  can  fix  the 
amount  of  money  in  circulation  is  about 
the  same  as  saying  that  since  the  Gov- 
ernment does  not  fix  the  amount  of 
flour  to  be  sold,  therefore  the  grocer 
who  sells  it  will. 

In  short,  the  one  accurate  statement 
of  our  correspondent  is  that  it  is  easy 
to  tear  down.  It  is  very  easy.  The 
United  States  from  1878  to  1892  built 
up  a  system,  not  perfect  in  every  re- 
spect, but  furnishing  abundant  money, 
having  a  larger  total  than  ever  before, 
and  permitting  the  transaction  of  bus- 
iness on  a  scale  previously  undreamed 
of.  The  persons  who  wish  to  tear  down 
that  system  of  credit  and  solvency  are 

Mr   w and  his  associates  in  the 

free  silver  cult.  If  that  writer  will  re- 
flect on  the  failure  of  every  one  of  his 
assertions  to  stand  the  test  of  compari- 
son with  the  established  facts,  it  may 
suggest  to  him  the  propriety  of  study- 
ing the  topic  a  little  more  accurately  be- 
fore proceeding  with  the  work  of  de- 
struction. 

This  is  especially  the  case  with  Mr. 

W 's  surprise  at  our  assertion  that 

a  man  can  obtain  gold  now  with  the 
same  effort  that  he  could  obtain  an 


equal  value  of  silver.  "Certainly  a 
new  idea,"  he  exclaims.  On  the  con- 
trary, it  is  one  of  the  oldest  and  most 
primary  ideas.  A  certain  amount  of 
effort  is  necessary  now  to  obtain  a  gold 
dollar.  Free  coinage  or  other  legisla- 
tion may  give  us  a  dollar  which  will  be 
worth  half  as  much  as  the  present  gold 
doMar.  In  /that  case  half  the  effort  may 
get  a  dollar,  but  to  get  the  same  pur- 
chasing value  as  the  original  gold  dol- 
lar, the  same  effort  will  be  required. 

The  communication  of  F.  H.  B.  un- 
dertakes to  challenge  a  statement  of 
fact  by  The  Dispatch  in  a  way  which 
we  hope  he  would  not  have  essayed  if 
he  had  read  all  the  facts  which  The 
Dispatch  has  produced  in  various  art- 
icles on  that  subject.  It  is  true,  as  he 
says,  that  there  were  coined  from  1868  to 
1873  silver  dollars  running  from  $182,- 
700  up  to  $1,118,600.  It  is  also  true— 
which  fact  he  does  not  state— that  after 
1873  the  silver  coinage  nearly  doubled 
the  first  year,  quadrupled  the  second, 
and  so  on  up  to  $24,000,000  and  $28,- 
000,000  in  1876  and  1877,  all  under  the 
provisions  of  a  law  alleged  to  have 
stricken  down  silver.  It  is  also  true 
that  a  large  share  of  this  increase  was 
due  to  the  coinage  of  trade  dollars  in 
amounts  from  $3,000,000  up  to  $11,000,- 
000  annually,  which  were  used  for  the 
same  purpose  as  the  dollars  coined  be- 
fore 1873,  namely,  for  exportation  as 
merchandise,  and  for  the  reason  which 
our  correspondent  states,  though  he 
does  not  seem  to  comprehend  its  bear- 
ing, that  the  silver  dollar  was  worth 
more  for  exportation  than  it  was  for 
circulation.  If  a  man  had  a  thousand 
dollars  in  silver,  would  he  pay  it  out  as 
a  thousand  dollars,  when  he  could  get 
$1,170  for  it  for  exportation  to  China  or 
India?  It  is  true,  as  F.  H.  B.  states, 
that  the  production  of  gold  exceeded 
that  of  silver  in  1872;  also,  therefore, 
then,  as  for  22  years  previous,  as  The 
Dispatch  has  pointed  out  over  and  over 
again,  silver  did  not  circulate  as  money, 
was  practically  demonetized,  not  in 
1873,  but  in  1853,  and  the  United  States 
was  recognized  to  be  on  a  gold  basis  by 


65 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


every  existing  fact  up  to  the  time  when 
it  suspended  specie  payments.  Our 
contributor  has  got  hold  of  these  facts, 
but  he  has  not  yet  grasped  the  cogency 
of  their  bearing  as  establishing  the  fol- 
lowing results: 

First — Since  the  demand  of  the  whole 
world  for  gold  did  not  prevent  it  from 
being  cheaper  than  silver,  when  it  was 
produced  most  largely,  it  is  utter  folly 
now,  to  expect  the  United  States  alone 
to  hold  silver  at  a  parity  with  gold  when 
silver  has  been  produced  most  largely. 

Second— The  fact  being  that  silver 
was  not  at  a  parity  with  gold,  but  was 
at  a  premium  of  2  to  7  per  cent  from 
1850  to  1873,  it  was  during  that  time 
an  article  of  merchandise,  was  not  in 
monetary  use  in  the  United  States,  and 
therefore  the  legislation  of  the  United 
States  did  not  demonetize  anything  in 
actual  use,  but  has,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
multiplied  the  coinage  and  use  of  sil- 
ver dollars  more  than  fifty  fold. 

Third— The  fact  being  that  silver 
was  proportionately  the  most  costly  and 
scarcer  metal,  the  allegation  that  a 
conspiracy  "to  make  the  rich  richer 
and  the  poor  poorer"  selected  the  more 
abundant  and  cheaper  metal,  contains 
the  proof  of  its  own  persistent  absurd- 
ity. 

The  Dispatch  has  now  for  six  weeks 
opened  its  columns  to  the  silver  dis- 
putants. It  has  not  concealed  its  own 
opinions,  but  has  confined  its  work  to 
making  a  fair  and  thorough  examina- 
tion of  the  allegations  and  arguments 
made  by  the  silver  advocates.  It  now 
regards  it  as  proper  to  wind  up  the  de- 
bate by  stating  in  a  series  of  articles  its 
own  deductions  from  the  facts  which 
have  been  demonstrated  in  the  discus- 
sion. It  publishes  to-day  the  communi- 
cations received,  but  will,  after  this 
week,  close  its  columns  to  the  miscel- 
laneous debate.  If,  for  a  few  days  af- 
ter, any  of  its  free  silver  friends  wish 
to  discuss  any  of  the  statistical  or  his- 
torical facts  established  by  our  discus- 
sion, not  by  sheer  contradiction  or  dog- 
matic assertions,  but  by  the  citation  of 
authorities,  we  will  consider  such  arti- 


cles. Beyond  that,  we  will  publish  a 
limited  number  of  answers  which  fair- 
ly discuss  these  two  pivotal  questions, 
one  of  which  we  have  asked  fre- 
quently without  getting  an  answer,  and 
the  other  of  which  we  have  held  in  re- 
serve until  we  reached  it  in  the  course 
of  discussion,  only  the  other  day. 

First— Since  the  demand  of  the  whole 
world  for  gold  could  not  prevent  its  de- 
cline in  the  '50's  and  '60's,  when  it  was 
the  more  abundant  metal,  what  reason 
is  there  to  hope  that  the  United  States 
by  its  solitary  and  unaided  action  can 
raise  the  price  of  the  world's  stock  of 
silver  when  it  is  the  more  abundant? 

Second — If  on  account  of  an  alleged 
advance  in  the  purchasing  power  of 
gold,  it  is  proposed  to  scale  down  debts 
by  reducing  the  standard,  through  free 
coinage,  what  is  the  justice  of  scaling 
down  the  debts  of  the  past  ten  years, 
contracted  on  a  gold  basis,  and  which 
constitute  over  three-quarters  of  the 
present  outstanding  debt? 


XVI.— Prices  and  Lenders. 

The  only  communication  that  we 
have,  bearing  on  the  issue  of  free  coin- 
age in  the  United  States  alone,  is  from 
a  contributor  who  has  occupied  at- 
tention in  recent  articles.  With  regard 
to  our  answer  to  his  former  arguments 
he  sends  the  following,  which  is  brief 
enough  to  give  in  this  connection : 

"To  the  Editor  of  The  Dispatch: 

"Your  explanation  is  that  gold  shall 
be  the  only  money,  that  the  way  to  get 
it  is  to  sell  cheaper  than  European  na- 
tions, and  that  means  European  prices 
for  everything  in  America.  I  am  glad 
you  have  come  out  at  last,  and  acknowl- 
edge the  corn,  if  this  is  what  the  gold 
standard  means,  that  European  prices 
and  European  wages  will  hereafter  pre- 
vail here.  If  the  people  are  satisfied 
with  this,  there  is  no  use  discussing 
the  question  further.  The  silver  peo- 
ple hoped  by  increased  use  of  silver  as 
a  money  of  redemption  to  keep  prices  of 
property,  commodities  and  labor  above 


66 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


that  of  Europe;  but  I  see  you  are  not 
in  favor  of  this. 

"R.  L.  W ." 

This  is  characteristic  of  a  certain 
type  of  free  coinage  disputant.  The 
former  communications  of  this  writer 
had  been  as  to  the  amount  of  money 
that  should  be  in  circulation,  and  the 
source  whence  the  basic  money  should 
be  obtained.  The  Dispatch  having  in 
the  discussion  of  these  questions  been 
obliged  to  show  the  incorrectness  of 
Mr.  W—  — s  statements  of  fact,  he 
finds  it  convenient  to  break  out  in  reply 
to  the  accusation  "You  wish  gold  to  be 
the  only  money,  and  to  have  European 
prices  and  wages  in  this  country."  The 
writer  knew,  if  he  has  paid  any  atten- 
tion to  The  Dispatch's  position,  that 
it  is  in  favor  of  the  use  of  both  gold 
and  silver  on  conditions  that  will  keep 
the  double  standard  stable  and  secure. 
But  between  gold  monometallism  and 
silver  monometallism,  which  is  what 
the  free  coinage  proposition  means,  The 
Dispatch  decidely  prefers  the  former. 

As  to  the  accusation  that  The  Dis- 
patch is  in  favor  of  European  wages, 
the  complete  answer  to  that  is  in  a 
statistical  statement  that  The  Dispatch 
has  already  made  half  a  dozen  times, 
but  which  we  are  entirely  willing  to  re- 
peat for  Mr.  W 's  especial  benefit. 

In  1870  there  were  2,053,996  employes 
in  the  manufacturing  establishments 
in  the  United  States,  and  each  received 
average  annual  wages  of  $306  in  gold 
value.  In  1890  there  were  4,712,622  em- 
ployes, and  the  average  wages  per  year 
were  $484.  When  the  two  decades  dur- 
ing which  our  present  monetary  sys- 
tem has  been  in  operation  show  that  135 
per  cent  more  men  have  been  employed, 
and  that  each  got  60  per  cent  more  wag- 
es, we  are  in  favor  of  that  result,  wheth- 
er our  correspondent  calls  it  European 
wages,  Chinese  wages  or  American 
wages.  It  is  true  that  three  years  of 
Democratic  tariff  muddling  and  Popu- 
list assaults  on  public  credit  have  low- 
ered wages  from  where  they  were  in 
1890;  and  whatever  credit  our  free  sil- 


ver friends  claim  for  that  result  they 
are  welcome  to. 

This  sort  of  argument  would  not  be 
worth  noticing,  or,  indeed,  publishing, 
if  it  were  not  that  the  talk  about  cheap 
prices  and  high  prices  has  been  the 
stock  in  trade  of  the  free  silver  boom- 
ers for  the  past  few  weeks.  The  ad- 
dress of  the  free  silver  seceders  at  St. 
Louis  rung  all  the  changes  on  the  sin 
of  cheap  prices,  and  the  great  public 
duty  of  raising  prices.  So  far  as  the 
flood  of  oratory  at  Chicago  approxi- 
mated anything  definite  at  all,  it  meant 
the  same  thing.  It  is  worth  while  to 
stop  and  see  what  it  means. 

Prices,   as  regards   the  relation   of 
these  in  this  country  to  those  abroad, 
are  to  be  divided  into  two  classes;  the 
prices  of  the  commodities  we  buy  from 
foreign  countries,  and  the  prices  of  the 
commodities  we  sell  to  foreign  coun- 
tries.    If  it  were  possible  for  legisla- 
tion  to  raise  the  prices  of  the   first 
class  above  their  present  parity  with 
foreign  prices  we  fail  to  see  how  the 
people  of  America  would  be  benefited 
in  having  to  pay  more  for  their  coffee, 
tea  and  sugar.    We  have  no  doubt  that 
every  free  silver  man,  when  confronted 
with  this  phase  of  the  subject,  will  dis- 
claim   any   intention    of    making  the 
people  pay  more  for  this  class  of  goods, 
although  it  is  an  essential  part  of  their 
proposition.  So  we  will  turn  to  the  prices 
of  the  staples  which  we  sell  to  Europe 
and  other  countries,  to  the  extent  of 
eight  hundred  or  a  thousand  millions 
per  annum.    These  are  the  prices  which 
our  free  silver  men  wish  to  see  raised 
above  the  European  level.    We  would 
gladly  join  them  in  the  wish  if  it  were 
not  for  one  little  difficulty.   We  are  only 
able  to  sell  these  hundreds  of  millions  of 
cereals  and  provisions  abroad  by  pro- 
ducing them  at  a  lower  level  of  prices 
than  in  the  European  markets.    If  leg- 
islation could  raise  our  prices  so  that 
the   farmer*  would   be  unable   to   sell 
wheat  to  Europe,  or  pork  or  anything 
else,  because  it  is  higher  than  in  Eu- 
rope, we  fail  to  see  that  either  the  far- 


67 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


mer  or  the  nation  would  gain  very  much 
from  his  inability  to  sell  his  products. 

Now,  how  do  our  friends  propose  to 
raise  prices?  By  free  coinage?  How 
will  that  raise  them?  By  reducing  the 
value  of  the  dollar.  Here  we  have  a 
clear  acknowledgement  that  free  coin- 
age will  reduce  the  value  of  the  dollar 
to  the  level  of  the  market  value  of  the 
bullion,  because,  if,  as  the  Democratic 
candidate  professes  to  believe,  it 
would  raise  silver  to  the  parity  of  gold, 
it  would  not  change  prices  at  all.  They 
would  be  measured  in  the  same  dollars 
as  before.  Their  contention  is  true  so  far 
that  if  you  reduce  the  value  of  the  dol- 
lar one  half,  the  thing  which  previous- 
ly sold  for  one  dollar  will,  after  the  con- 
vulsion is  over,  sell  for  two.  Is  the 
change  anything  more  than  a  nominal 
one?  Suppose  that  we  should  accom- 
plish the  same  result  by  enacting  that 
every  dollar  coin  shall  be  two  dollars? 
The  thing  that  sells  for  one  dollar  now 
advances  to  two  dollars,  and  sells  for 
exactly  the  same  coin  as  before. 

Let  us  see  for  a  moment  just  what 
this  question  of  prices  under  free  coin- 
age means.  We  desert  the  gold  dollar 
standard  and  take  a  silver  dollar  stan- 
dard, worth,  say,  half  as  much.  Of 
course  prices  double.  The  first  thing 
that  they  double  on  is  on  goods  im- 
ported from  abroad,  because  they  come 
into  our  ports  on  a  gold  standard,  and 
the  moment  our  money  sinks  below  the 
gold  standard,  the  exchange  in  which 
the  purchase  of  Coffee  or  tea  is  settled 
will  include  the  difference  between  our 
money  and  the  gold  money.  So  that  the 
first  result  of  the  blessing  of  high  prices 
will  be  that  the  American  people  will 
have  to  pay  more  for  what  they  buy 
before  they  get  more  for  what  they  sell. 

But,  in  the  course  of  time,  the  prices 
of  domestic  produce  will  rise  in  propor- 
tion. That  which  is  worth  50  cents  by 
the  gold  standard  will  be  worth  a  dol- 
lar by  the  silver  standard.  But  will  it 
be  actually  worth  any  more?  There  is 
a  very  clear  test  in  one  important  and 
leading  example.  Wheat  is  worth  63c 
in  New  York  (gold),  because  it  is  worth 


5s  Id  in  Liverpool.  Now,  if  free  coin- 
age should  give  us  a  dollar  worth  half 
as  much  as  the  present  dollar,  it  would 
make  wheat  worth  $1.26  in  New  York, 
in  silver;  but  that  this  would  be  exactly 
the  same  price  as  before  is  apparent  in 
the  fact  that  it  would  be  worth  $1.26 
in  silver  only  because  it  was  worth 
the  same  5s  Id  in  gold  in  Liverpool. 

It  is  well  to  use  a  little  common  sense 
in  discussing  these  questions  of  high 
and  low  prices.  But  when  our  free  sil- 
ver friends  indulge  in  these  glittering 
generalities  and  fierce  denunciations  on 
the  subject,  they  indicate  a  greater 
scarcity  of  that  article  than  they  allege 
to  be  the  case  with  gold. 

It  is  plain  from  this  illustration,  as 
we  have  often  pointed  out  before,  that, 
apart  from  the  convulsion  and  dam- 
age of  the  descent  to  a  cheaper  stand- 
ard, and  the  invariable  truth  that  the 
heaviest  losers  from  such  a  change  are 
those  least  able  to  stand  it,  and  least 
able  to  protect  themselves  against  it, 
the  real  effect  of  free  coinage  is  on  the 
payment  of  debts  contracted  before  the 
change.  The  actual  and  permanent  re- 
sult which  free  silver  can  accomplish 
is,  by  cheapening  the  dollar,  to  reduce 
every  debt  existing  before  the  change 
in  exact  proportion  to  the  cheapening. 
This  makes  it  pertinent  to  return  to 
the  examination  of  that  proposition.  We 
have  taken  up  various  phases  of  it  here- 
tofore. We  now  wish  to  call  attention 
to  the  classes  it  will  affect. 

There  is  nothing  in  which  the  shal- 
lowness  and  ignorance  of  the  free  sil- 
ver school  is  more  strikingly  displayed 
than  in  their  assumption  that  a  scaling 
down  of  debts  by  cheapening  the  dol- 
lar is  an  advantage  for  the  masses. 
They  picture  the  lender  as  a  money- 
bags and  a  "bloated  bondholder," 
bursting  with  wealth;  while  the  bor- 
rower is  a  needy,  hard-working  man, 
struggling  to  pay  his  interest  and  get 
a  subsistence  for  his  family.  This 
broad  portrayal  is  greedily  accepted  by 
the  masses  to  whom  it  is  addressed, 
without  ever  stopping  to  inquire  what 
the  actual  facts  are.  We  propose  to 


68 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


correct  that  omission  by  a  few  statistics 
as  to  the  leading  money-lending  classes, 
and  to  follow  that  up  in  the  future  by 
examples  of  the  borrowing  classes. 

One  of  the  largest  money-lending 
classes,  in  point  of  number,  are  the  de- 
positors in  savings  banks.  There  are 
4,875,519  of  them.  Their  deposits,  ac- 
cording to  the  latest  statistics  we  have, 
were  $1,810,597,023.  In  other  words,  the 
average  deposits  of  these  millions  was 
$371.36.  That  there  are  some  well-to- 
do  people  who  put  a  little  money  aside 
in  savings  banks  is  undoubtedly  true; 
but  the  great  mass  of  them  are  hard- 
working, frugal  people,  who  have  laid 
aside  a  little  for  old  age  or  a  rainy  day. 
Yet,  because  the  free  silver  men  allege 
that  an  indefinite  and  disputable  wrong 
was  done  23  years  ago,  they  propose  to 
take  away  from  these  4,875,000  money- 
lenders about  half  of  their  hard-earned 
savings. 

The  next  numerous  class  of  the 
wicked  money-lenders  are  the  members 
of  building  and  loan  associations. 
There  are  1,745,000  of  them.  They  have 
saved  $450,667,594,  or  an  average  of 
$257.26  each.  There  are  very  exact  sta- 
tistics as  to  the  classes  composing 
them.  Of  the  membership,  58.89  per 
cent  are  artisans,  mechanics,  house- 
keepers, laborers,  mill  and  factory  em- 
ployes;  22.80  per  cent  are  salaried 
clerks,  saleswomen,  Government  em- 
ployes, etc.;  12.25  per  cent  merchants 
and  dealers;  2.96  per  cent  manufactur- 
ers and  capitalists;  2.10  per  cent  agents 
and  brokers,  and  a  fractional  percent- 
age each  of  corporation  officials  and 
lodges,  churches  and  societies.  Of  the 
savings  of  this  class,  the  great  bulk  of 
whom  are  hard-working  and  frugal,  the 
free  silver  idea  proposes  to  take 
away  about  one-half  because  they  be- 
long to  the  category  alleged  to  have  op- 
pressed the  debtor  more  than  two  dec- 
ades ago. 

Another  very  large  class  of  creditors, 
but  not  so  large  as  either  of  the  two 
just  named,  are  the  holders  of  life  in- 
surance policies.  There  are  1,496,356 
life  insurance  policies  outstanding.  A 


great  many  people  have  more  than  one 
life  insurance  policy,  so  that  it  is  prob- 
able that  the  number  of  this  class  would 
be  somewhere  about  1,200,000.  But  each 
policy  represents  a  debt  to  be  scaled, 
and  can  be  viewed  in  that  line.  The  life 
insurance  policy  holder  is  generally  bet- 
ter off  than  the  savings  bank  depositor 
or  member  of  a  building  and  loan  asso- 
cition.  Some  rich  men  carry  a  good 
deal  of  life  insurance;  but  the  vast  mass 
of  the  insurers  are  men  of  ordinary 
means  who  thus  provide  an  assurance 
for  their  families.  The  members  of  the 
beneficiary  orders,  who  are  to  be  sub- 
jected to  the  same  attack  are  not  given 
by  exact  statistics,  but  is  asserted  to  be 
several  millions.  The  total  savings 
of  this  form  in  reserve,  and  surplus  as 
to  policies,  is  $1,156,061,796.  The  face 
of  the  policies  is  far  more,  but  the  aver- 
age savings  on  each  policy  is  $772.65. 
And  because  they  have  saved  this  sum, 
a  little  each  year  through  many  years, 
the  great  free  silver  idea  proposes  to 
punish  them  by  taking  away  about  $386 
from  each  average  value,  on  account  of 
the  wickedness  of  belonging  to  the 
money-lending  class! 

The  fire  insurance  policy  holder  is  a 
peculiar  illustration  of  the  actual  ap- 
plication of  the  brilliant  free  silver 
idea.  The  statistics  do  not  give  the 
number  of  insurers,  but  we  know  that 
it  must  include  at  least  two-thirds"  of 
all  men  doing  business,  and  a  great 
majority  of  the  householders  of  the 
country.  The  total  risks  written,  by 
the  statistics  at  hand,  was  over  $16,000,- 
000,000;  but  the  value  of  the  insurance 
shown  by  the  policy  holders'  surplus 
was  $1,352,225,196.  Estimating  the 
household  insurers  at  1,200,000  and  the 
business  Insurers  at  600,000,  which  is 
conjectural  but  surely  within  the  lim- 
its, this  makes  the  average  investment 
in  fire  insurance  about  $750  to  each  per- 
son. From  each  of  these  persons,  every 
one  of  them  producers,  the  great  free 
silver  idea  proposes  to  take  away  half 
of  the  value  of  his  policy  in  force  when 
the  change  of  standard  -takes  place. 

We  might  extend  this  list,  but  the 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


examples  are  sufficient  to  enforce  our 

point.     We  will  recapitulate  them  in 

the    following    table    of    the    leading 

money-lending  classes: 

Number.  Investment. 
Total. 

Sav.     bank     de- 
positors  4,875,519  $1,810,597,023 

B.  and  L.  mem- 
bers  1,745,000        450,667,594 

Life    Ins.    policy 
holders 1,200,000    1,156,061,796 

Fire    Ins.    policy 
holders  .         ..1,800,000    1,352,225,196 


Total 9,620,519  $4,769,551,609 

The  number  of  these  overlap  each 
other,  some  fire  insurance  policy  hold- 
ers being  life  policy  holders,  and  so  on. 
But  they  represent  nearly  10,000,000 
eases  and  probably  not  less  than  8,000,- 
000  individuals,  whose  savings  are  to  be 
depleted  by  the  great  free  silver  plan  of 
paying  old  debts.  Their  investments 
iu  public  bonds,  railroad  bonds  and  real 
estate  mortgages  are  over  one-third  of 
the  total  of  debts.  Of  them,  6,500,000 
belong  to  the  modest  and  frugal  class 
having  savings  of  a  few  hundreds  each 
in  savings  banks  and  building  and  loan 
associations.  The  list  might  be  ex- 
tended by  showing  other  classes  of 
small  lenders.  But  our  purpose  is  at- 
tained by  the  proof  of  the  following 
fact. 

•That  these  four  classes,  made  up 
almost  entirely  of  productive  class- 
es, the  majority  of  them  being  wagre- 
workers,  are  especially  attacked  by 
the  free  silver  scheme  of  scaling 
down  debts  and  investments. 

*     *     * 
XVII.— The  Great  Borrowers. 

In  the  last  article  The  Dispatch  gave 
the  particulars  as  to  the  membership  of 
four  of  the  largest  money  lending  class- 
es, the  savings  bank  depositors,  build- 
ing and  loan  association  members,  life 
insurance  and  fire  insurance  policy 
holders.  They  comprise  not  less  than 
8,000,000  people,  practically  all  of  them 
of  the  productive  class  and  fully  three- 
quarters  of  them  people  of  small  means, 
whose  savings  from  $250  up  to  about 


$800,  on  the  average,  the  free  silver  plan 
of  having  debts  paid  in  a  cheaper  dol- 
lar will  cut  down  nearly  one-half.  We 
now  proposes  to  instance  some  of  the 
leading  examples  of  borrowers. 

The  Vanderbilts  are  borrowers  in 
their  capacity  as  railroad  shareholders. 
They  have  investments,  of  course,  of 
the  class  that  bears  interest;  but  the 
great  source  and  present  key  to  their 
commanding  wealth  is  in  the  owner- 
ship of  controlling  interests  in  the  New 
York  Central,  Lake  Shore,  Canada 
Southern,  Nickel  Plate,  West  Shore,  and 
a  score  of  other  roads.  The  mortgage 
debt  of  these  corporations  is  counted  by 
the  hundreds  of  millions.  If  the  free 
silver  scheme  of  reducing  debts  by  a 
cheaper  dollar  were  carried  out,  the 
stockholders  of  these  corporations 
would  get  the  benefit  and  the  Vander- 
bilt  and  Morgan  interest,  as  the  chief 
stockholders,  would  get  the  chief  ben- 
efit 

The  Goulds  are  borrowers  in  the  same 
capacity.  The  pivotal  character  of  that 
fortune  is  the  control  by  holding  the 
majority  of  stock  in  the  Missouri  Pa- 
cific, Western  Union  Telegraph,  New 
York  Elevated  and  other  corporations. 
There  are  something  like  $130,000,000 
of  debts  of  these  corporations,  the  re- 
duction of  which  would  accrue  mainly 
to  the  benefit  of  the  Goulds. 

The  corporations  controlled  by  C.  P. 
Huntington  and  his  associates  are 
among  the  greatest  borrowers,  in  pro- 
portion to  actual  value,  in  the  whole 
country.  The  debts  of  the  Central  and 
Southern  Pacifies  and  tributary  lines 
count  up  to  the  neighborhood  of  $300,- 
000,000,  which,  according  to  our  free  sil- 
ver friends,  ought  to  be  reduced  on  ac- 
count of  the  hardship  that  was  inflicted 
on  the  borrowers  23  years  ago. 

We  might  multiply  the  illustrations, 
but  the  three  leading  cases  are  suffi- 
cient. They  are  accompanied  by  scores 
of  others.  It  is  a  well-known  fact  that 
the  greatest  borrowers  are  the  men  of 
large  operations.  It  is  also  a  leading 
fact  of  vital  bearing  on  the  stupid  shal- 
lowness  of  the  free  silver  remedy  that 


70 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


all  the  men  who  have  built  up  vast  for- 
tunes within  the  period  during  which 
it  is  alleged  that  the  gold  basis  has 
made  enterprise  impossible,  have  done 
so  by  borrowing.  The  speculators  who 
manipulate  stocks  are  the  most  reckless 
borrowers  of  all.  The  men  who  try  to 
lock  up  money  do  so,  in  nine  cases  out 
of  ten,  by  borrowing  the  money. 

It  is  not  to  be  said  that  in  the  rela- 
tion of  borrowers  from  the  great  mass 
of  the  smaller  investors  the  multi-mil- 
lionaires occupy  an  obnoxious  position. 
On  the  contrary,  that  operation  viewed 
strictly  by  itself  is  one  of  the  great 
means  of  progress.  When  an  enter- 
prising, able  man,  can  carry  on  great 
projects  by  borrowing  from  the  people 
who  have  saved  up  anywhere  from  $300 
to  $10,000  each,  there  is  a  ben- 
efit to  the  public,  and  to  both  borrower 
and  lender,  for  which  both  are  to  be 
credited.  It  is  for  the  reason  that  vast 
benefits  are  secured  by  the  legitimate 
and  honest  operation  of  this  system 
that  scrupulous  care  should  be  taken 
not  to  disturb  it.  If  anything  were 
done  to  make  the  system  of  interest- 
bearing  securities  unreliable  ana  unsafe 
it  would  be  one  of  the  greatest  calami- 
ties to  industry. 

But  it  is  to  be  noted  as  bearing  on  the 
distribution  of  wealth  that  many  of 
these  multi-millionaires  have  used  the 
opportunities  of  corporate  control,  in 
which  they  held  the  position  of  borrow- 
ers, to  concentrate  wealth  in  their  hands 
that  should  not  have  gone  there.  They 
have  taken  it  from  the  public  by  pref- 
erential freight  rates,  and  by  trusts  and 
pools;  they  have  taken  it  from  the  small 
stockholder  by  the  inside  rings  that 
absorbed  the  profits  of  the  corporations, 
and  by  manipulations  of  the  stocks. 
They  have,  in  many  cases,  fleeced  the 
ordinary  investors  by  selling  them 
bonds  alleged  to  be  mortgages,  but 
which,  by  reason  of  the  fictitious  nature 
of  the  stock,  had  none  of  the  security  of 
bonds  and  none  of  the  compensations 
of  stock.  While  these  operations,  varied 
in  detail,  but  comprising  the  essential 
characteristics  of  injustice,  have  built 


up  great  fortunes  in  the  hands  of  men 
who  were  borrowers  in  the  capacity  as 
stockholders  in  the  corporations  they 
control,  and  in  that  character  are  bor- 
rowers still,  the  monumental  stupidity 
of  the  free  silver  cult  proposes  to  take 
from  the  ordinary  and  legitimate  in- 
vestors in  nearly  $6,000,000,000  of  cor- 
porate bonds,  a  practical  moiety  and  to 
give  an  immense  share  of  that  gain  to 
the  speculators,  manipulators  and  cor- 
porate rulers  who  control  the  corpora- 
tions through  the  stocks.  That  amaz- 
ing display  of  ignorance  should  lead  to 
the  general  enforcement  of  these  two 
facts  on  the  public  mind. 

First— Every  great  fortune  that  has 
been  created  during  the  past  genera- 
tion has  got  its  start  through  borrow- 
ing operations;  and  the  means  by  which 
iodustry  and  transportation  are  con- 
trolled leave  those  controlling  them  in 
the  capacity  of  borrowers  as  stockhold- 
ers of  corporations. 

Second — There  is  not  a  single  case  in 
which  a  fortune  of  a  hundred,  or  fifty, 
or  ten,  or  even  five,  millions  has  been 
created  in  a  single  lifetime  simply  by 
the  lending  of  money  at  interest. 

There  are  two  examples  which  have 
been  prominent  in  Pittsburg  business 
during  the  period  of  alleged  demoneti- 
zation which  make  it  a  peculiarly  inex- 
cusable sort  of  ignorance  for  any  Pitts- 
burger  to  indulge  in  this  delusion  of 
scaling  down  debts  to  rectify  the  social 
inequalities.  It  was  just  about  1873 
when  one  of  the  National  banks  of  this 
city  began  to  come  into  notice  as  an 
enterprising  and  accommodating  insti- 
tution. Its  capital  was  $300,000,  but  in 
the  preceding  years  it  had  accumulated 
a  surplus  of  $300,000,  so  that  it  entered 
on  the  period  with  a  working  capital 
of  $600,000.  From  that  point  it  has 
grown  steadily  in  volume  of  business 
and  profits.  It  has  done  so,  according 
to  the  universal  testimony  of  its  cus- 
tomers, because  it  treated  them  liber- 
ally. It  could  not  grow  in  any  other 
way.  If  any  of  its  customers  could  get 
more  liberal  treatment  at  any  other 
bank,  they  had  the  full  privilege  of  go- 


71 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


ing  there.  But  because  depositors,  small 
and  large,  were  well  treated,  and  bor- 
rowers on  legitimate  commercial  paper 
knew  that  they  would  be  accommodat- 
ed, if  possible,  the  bank  prospered  not 
only  beyond  any  other  bank  in  Pitts- 
burg,  but  to  an  extent  not  equalled  by 
more  than  a  half-score  banks  in  the 
country.  The  net  result  of  all  this  pros- 
perity is  that  the  bank  has  been  pay- 
ing eight  to  ten  per  cent  dividends  on 
the  $600,000  capital  and  surplus  which 
it  had  at  the  beginning  of  this  period, 
and  has  increased  its  capital,  surplus 
and  undivided  profits  to  a  little  over 
$1,500,000.  In  other  words,  the  increase 
in  wealth  to  a  corporation  dealing  in 
leans  has  been  liberal  dividends  and  an 
increase  of  its  wealth  from  $600,000  to 
$1,500,000. 

About  the  same  time  that  this  bank 
became  prominent  in  Pittsburg,  another 
corporation  came  into  prominence  not 
only  in  Pittsburg,  but  all  over  the  coun- 
try. It  was  a  manufacturing  corpora- 
tion— an  oil  refining  company.  There 
was  a  time  about  1872  or  1873  that  its 
capital  was  less  than  that  of  the  bank 
just  referred  to;  but  its  growth  was  so 
rapid  that  in  1874  or  1875  it  had  far 
greater  capital.  It  did  not  get  the  in- 
crease of  prosperity  by  doing  better  for 
its  customers  than  any  one  else,  in  fair 
competition.  It  got  it  by  freezing  out 
competition.  It  made  secret  arrange- 
with  the  railways  to  give  it  rates  that 
would  enable  it  to  refine  and  sell  oil  at 
a  profit,  while  its  competitors,  forced 
to  pay  the  higher  rates,  could  only 
dwindle  out  and  die  away.  It  borrowed 
money  to  carry  on  these  operations  at 
the  start;  but  its  profits  in  a  few  years 
did  away  with  the  necessity  of  borrow- 
ing for  that  purpose.  The  system  of 
favoritism  and  crushing  out  and  buying 
up  .competitors  continued  so  that  this 
corporation  was  estimated  to  be  worth 
$30,000,000  in  1878.  In  1882  it  was  cap- 
italized at  $90,000,000.  It  has  paid  div- 
idends ranging  from  $9,000,000  to  $20,- 
000,000  annually  for  many  years.  It  is 
now  estimated  by  market  quotations  at 
over  $240,000,000. 


The  examples  of  the  Farmers'  Deposit 
Bank  of  Pittsburg  and  of  the  Standard 
Oil  Company  are  typical  of  the  two 
classes.  Both  are  leaders  in  their 
class.  One  of  them,  by  -affording  ac- 
commodation and  credit  to  business, 
by  aiding  mercantile  and  manufactur- 
ing operations,  distributes  $48,000  to 
$60,000  annually  in  dividends  and  in- 
creases a  capital  of  $600,000  to  $1,500,- 
000.  The  other,  by  secret  arrangements 
with  railroads  to  crush  out  its  rivals 
distributes  $10,000,000  to  $20,000,000  ac 
nually,  and  on  the  start  of  less  than 
$600,000  cajpital  concentrates  a  total  of 
wealth  estimated  at  hundreds  of  mil- 
lions. One  is  the  representative  of 
honest,  legitimate  business,  a  benefit  to 
those  with  whom  it  deals.  The  other 
is  the  pattern  and  type  of  the  methods 
by  which  the  wealth  that  ought  to  be 
widely  diffused  is  concentrated  in  the 
hands  of  the  few.  Here  we  have  the 
fact  that  the  question  of  the  coinage, 
and  the  alleged  advantage  of  the  lend- 
ing class  for  the  two  decades  have  abso- 
lutely nothing  to  do  with  the  concentra- 
tion of  great  fortunes. 

It  should  not  be  understood  that  in 
citing  these  examples  The  Dispatch  is 
representing  that  none  of  the  multi- 
millionaires are  holders  of  interest- 
bearing  investments.  Many  of  them 
are.  The  Vanderbilts  have  large  hold- 
ings of  the  bonds  of  their  corporations, 
and  the  Goulds  of  theirs.  The  Standard 
Oil  millionaires  have  put  much  of  their 
surplus  wealth  in  loans.  But  the  point 
which  this  article  enforces  is  that  it 
is  in  the  control  of  corporate  manage- 
ment, securing  exclusive  favors  in 
transportation,  and  the  ability  to  man- 
ipulate stocks  and  securities  from  the 
inside,  that  the  source  of  the  great  for- 
tunes created  during  the  past  25  years 
is  to  be  found. 

In  the  character  of  stockholders  in  the 
railway  corporations,  the  great  manipu- 
lators occupy  the  relation  of  debtors  to 
the  bondholders  of  the  corporations.  It 
is  a  measure  of  the  crass  ignorance  of 
the  free  silver  craze  that  it  proposes  to 
take  away,  by  the  reduction  of  the 


72 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


standard,  the  legitimate  investments  of 
small  and  large  bondholders  alike,  and 
to  give  them  to  the  corporate  stockhold- 
ers, among  whom  the  great  millionaires 
are  leading  examples. 
*  *  * 

XVIII.— Creditors    and    Debtors. 

In  our  previous  articles  on  the  re- 
spective wealth  of  the  lending  and 
borrowing  classes,  the  statistics  are  not 
to  be  taken  as  asserting  that  all  bor- 
rowers are  wealthy  and  all  lenders  of 
the  poorer  and  frugal  class.  There  are 
large  numbers  of  wealthy  people  who 
have  considerable  investments  in  mort- 
gages; and  to  ignore  such  a  fact  would 
be  to  deny  a  self-evident  fact.  But  the 
figures  already  cited  show  that  a  great 
share  of  the  lending  and  borrowing, 
especially  as  regards  long-time  loans 
on  interest,  consists  of  the  saving  by 
people  of  smaller  property  of  various 
sums,  and  the  loan  by  a  number  of  them 
collectively  to  one  of  larger  property 
to  improve  his  property  or  to  extend  his 
business.  This  runs  through  the  whole 
mass  of  interest-bearing  investments 
from  those  of  the  smallest  amounts  in- 
dividually to  those  of  the  largest  char- 
acter. 

The  class  of  transactions  in  which 
the  individual     transactions     are     the 
smallest  in  amount,  and  in  which  the 
operation  is  most  clearly  shown  by  sta- 
tistics, are  those  of  the  building  and 
loan  associations.     Of  1,745,725  mem- 
bers of  these  associations,     there  are 
456,004  borrowers,  or  a  little  over  one- 
fourth.     The  operations  of  the  associ- 
ations may  be  described  as  consisting 
of  the  multiplication  by    hundreds  of 
'  thousands,    of    the    following    typical 
transaction:    Four   men  join   together 
their  savings  of  $257  each.     Three  of 
them  lend  their  savings,  making  a  lit- 
tle over  a  thousand  dollars  (the  statis- 
tical average  loan  is  $1,120)  to  build 
his  house.    But  in  order  to  do  this  the 
fourth  man  must  have  a  lot,  presuma- 
bly worth  not  less  than  $340,  so  as  to 
make  the  mortgage  not     more     than 
three-fourths  of  the  value  of  the  prop- 
erty after  the  improvement  is  made. 


The  transaction  then  is  that  three  men 
with  $257  savings  each  have  lent  their 
savings  to  one  man  with  savings  and 
property  worth  not  less  than  $597.  By 
this  transaction  the  borrower  is  enabled 
to  build  a  house  and  from  it  obtain 
an  income  to  pay  the  three  othefs  the 
interest  on  their  loan,  and  in  addition 
secure  a  revenue  from     his    property 
which  would  otherwise  have  been  un- 
productive.   All  are  benefited,  and  the 
benefit  to  society  consists  in  the  fact 
that  up  to  1893  this  sort  of  transaction 
had  enabled  the  building  of  over  314,000 
homes  for  the  people.    It  is  true  that 
the  lenders  may  in  some  cases  have  had 
other  property  than  that  shown  in  the 
statistics,  and  so  may  the  borrowers. 
On  the  fact  of  the  transactions,  how- 
ever, the  lenders  are  men  of  smaller 
means  lending  to  borrowers  of  larger 
means,  and  that  is  well  known  to  be 
the  exact  fact  with  regard  to  the  vast 
bulk  of  building  and  loan  transactions. 
In  the  savings  bank  transactions  the 
statistics  as  to  the  class  of  borrowers 
are  not  so  clear.     Nevertheless,  there 
are  some  very  strong    indications    to 
show  the  fact.     The  average  savings 
bank  depositor  has  saved  up  $371.  But 
the  average  loan  from  savings  institu- 
tions must  be  very  much  more  than 
that,  because    the    average    mortgage 
loan  on  lots  is  $1,540,  while  the  invest- 
ments in  bonds  must  deal  with  corpor- 
ate operations  carried  on  by  men  of 
considerable  wealth.    The  savings  bank 
transactions,  therefore,  must  consist  of 
not  less  than  five  frugal  workers  who 
have  saved  over  $300  each,  lending  their 
savings  to  men  who  own  property  at 
least   twice   as   great   as   the   average 
savings   of  the   lenders,   and   running 
up  to  the  cases  in  which  the  borrow- 
ers  are   corporations   or   operators   of 
large  property. 

There  is  another  way  of  illustrating 
the  same  fact.  The  borrowers  on  real 
estate  mortgages  constitute  the  class 
in  which  the  hardship  of  the  debtor 
is  most  dwelt  on.  Ther  are  4,777,698  of 
them,  2,303,061  who  have  mortgaged 
acres,  and  2,474,637  who  have  mort- 


73 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


gaged  lots.  The  borrowers  on  acres  are 
the  smallest  borrowers  on  record,  the 
average  mortgage  being  $959.  But  the 
two  classes  of  lenders  of  record  com- 
prising the  largest  number  are  the 
savings  bank  depositors  and  building 
arid  loan  members.  There  are  4,875,519 
of  the  former,  and  1,299,721  of  the  lend- 
ing shareholders  of  the  latter.  But  the 
average  savings  of  the  former  are  but 
$371,  and  of  the  latter  but  $257.  Here 
are  6,175,340  lenders  of  the  poorer  class 
against  4,777,698  borrowers  of  the  cor- 
responding class.  The  total  savings  of 
the  6,000,000  are  $2,260,000,000,  or  just 
about  equal  to  the  $2,209,148,431  bor- 
rowings of  the  farmers  on  acres,  or 
three  lenders  to  one  borrower  in  that 
class.  But  the  statistics  of  the  United 
States  census  show  that  the  mortgage 
on  acres  averages  less  than  40  per  cent 
of  its  true  value,  so  that  the  property 
of  the  borrower  in  real  estate  value 
alone,  not  counting  farm  stock  and  ma- 
chinery, is  worth  $2,397.  Deducting  the 
mortgage,  we  have  2,303,000  of  the  bor- 
rowers of  the  least  means  with  net 
property  of  $1,838  each,  against  6,175,- 
000  of  the  lenders  of  the  least  means, 
with  average  savings  of  about  $360 
each.  !  i  , 

The  same  result  attends  the  compar- 
ison of  the  other  large  classes  of  lend- 
ing and  borrowings.  The  investments 
belonging  to  1,200,000  life  insurance 
policy  holders  are  as  a  rule  put  into 
the  enterprises  of  the  greatest  magni- 
tude, such  as  railway  bonds  or  the 
mortgages  of  the  owners  of  large  prop- 
erty. The  same  is  true  with  fire  in- 
surance funds,  in  which  the  creditors 
are  the  great  mass  of  business  men  and 
property  holders.  In  both  of  these 
cases,  while  the  average  holding  or 
claim  of  the  creditor  is  less  than  a  thou- 
sand dollars,  the  investment  runs  all 
the  way  from  a  minimum  of  $1,000  up 
to  loans  of  hundreds  of  thousands  or 
even  millions. 

The  classes  gone  over  were  cited  the 
other  day,  to  show  the  number  of  mo- 
ney-lenders, belonging  almost  entirely 
to  the  wage-working  or  productive 


classes,  which  the  free  silver  delusion 
imagines  itself  to  favor  by  attacking 
the  money-lender.  There  are  two  or 
three  other  classes  which  deserve  at- 
tention when  we  come  to  compare  the 
relative  means  of  the  debtors  and  cred- 
itors. There  are  1,929,000  depositors  in 
the  national  banks.  Of  these  a  large 
share  are  business  men,  who  also  bor- 
row from  the  banks.  But,  considering 
that  there  are  only  1,200,000  business 
names  on  the  reference  books,  that 
some  of  these  are  not  depositors  in  any 
banks,  and  that  others  deposit  in  banks 
not  national,  it  is  safe  to  estimate  that 
there  are  a  million  depositors  in  the 
national  banks  who  are  not  borrowers. 
The  amount  of  their  deposits  can  only 
be  guessed  at  by  the  fact  that  the  busi- 
ness firms  who  are  borrowers  are  also 
among  the  largest  depositors,  so  that 
the  average  deposit  of  those  who  oc- 
cupy the  position  of  money-lenders 
must  be  below  the  average,  perhaps 
about  $600  each.  The  shareholder  in 
the  national  bank  is  also  one  of  the 
lending  class.  There  are  287,842  share- 
holders, and  the  average  holding  of 
stock  is  $2,337.  One-fourth  of  the  na- 
tional bank  stock  is  held  by  women. 

While  these  1,287,000  members  of  the 
money-lending  class  are  in  many  cases 
people  who  have  other  property,  and 
in  some  cases  include  people  of  large 
wealth,  they  also  include  a  vast  mass 
of  people  of  moderate  and  even  small 
savings  put  in  these  investments.  Their 
position  relatively  to  the  borrowers  is 
shown  in  one  fact.  The  borrowers  from 
national  banks  are  necessarily  people 
of  property.  They  must  be  merchants 
or  manufacturers.  It  is  safe  to  say 
that  the  vast  mass  of  the  loans  and  dis- 
counts of  the  national  banks  of  Pitts- 
burg  are  on  the  paper  of  concerns  with 
capital  running  from  $20,000  up  into  the 
millions.  A  borrower  who  has  not  at 
least  $5,000  to  $10,000  capital  would 
have  little  standing  in  any  bank.  So 
again  we  see  that  the  lender  may  be  a 
person  of  small  means,  and  is,  in  the 
majority  of  cases  in  this  class,  one  of 
moderate  means,  while  the  borrower  is 


74 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


one  of  larger — and  perhaps  of  the  larg- 
est— resources  increasing  these  re- 
sources by  the  operations  conducted 
with  the  money  borrowed. 

If  we  add  to  this  case  the  similar 
cases  of  banks  and  trust  companies  for 
which  there  are  no  statistics,  but  in 
which  the  same  fact  appears  that  the 
savings  of  people,  which  will  not,  in 
the  average,  rise  above  moderate 
means,  are  loaned  to  large  corporations 
and  great  operators,  the  total  cases  of 
the  lending  classes  capable  of  an  esti- 
mate will  rise  to  between  eleven  and 
twelve  millions,  or  over  half  the  pro 
ductive  population  of  the  United  States. 
If  these  people  averaged  $1,000  each  in 
their  holdings,  they  would  own  nearly 
all  of  the  corporate  and  mortgage  debt 
of  the  country.  They  do  not  hold  so 
much,  however.  The  total  of  their 
holdings  is  about  $8,000,000,000  out  of 
$15,000,000,000  of  corporate  and  mort- 
gage debt  and  bank  loans.  The  rest  of 
the  debt  is  held  by  people  of  various 
means,  many  of  whom  are  also  small  in- 
vestors. 

One  more  example  is  enough  to  en- 
force this  fact.  The  debt  of  corpora- 
tions— railway,  street  railway,  tele- 
graph, telephone,  water,  gas,  heat  and 
power  companies— is  $6,000,000,000.  As 
a  rule,  these  corporations  are  conduct- 
ed by  large  operators.  In  many  cases 
the  stock  is  simply  a  fiction,  the  capital 
being  actually  secured  by  floating 
loans,  alleged  to  have  the  security  of 
a  mortgage,  but  really  having  no  more 
security  than  bona  fide  stock.  Wheth- 
er the  stock  is  watered  or  not,  it  is  a 
hardly  less  general  rule  that  the  great 
mass  of  the  money  invested  in  corporate 
bonds  is  the  money  of  the  ordinary  and 
small  investors.  The  corporate  abuses 
of  the  day  are  so  great  that  the  ordi- 
nary and  small  investor  is  not  safe  in 
putting  his  money  into  the  shares  of 
corporations  for  fear  he  may  be  manip- 
ulated or  frozen  out.  The  same  abuses 
have  prejudiced  and  damaged  the  in- 
vestments in  the  so-called  mortgages, 
but  not  to  one-tenth  the  extent  that 
is  involved  in  taking  nearly  half  the 


investment  of  the  small  investor,  and, 
by  a  scaling  down  of  the  standard,  giv- 
ing it  to  the  great  operator  who  has 
control  of  the  corporation  through  its 
shares. 

One  of  the  greatest  needs  of  the  coun- 
try is  to  encourage  the  wage-working 
classes  to  save  and  invest  their  money. 
This  can  only  be  done  by  guarding  the 
stability  of  the  investments  in  which 
they  put  their  funds,  and  insuring  that 
they  shall  get  an  honest  return  for  the 
money  which  they  put  into  any  securi- 
ty. It  is  one  of  the  crying  sins  of  the 
day  that  corporate  juggling  with  inside 
rings,  construction  companies  and 
stock  manipulators,  has  so  prejudiced 
the  position  of  the  small  shareholder 
that  no  conscientious  and  well-inform- 
ed man  could  advise  the  workingmen 
to  put  their  savings  into  the  shares  of 
the  average  corporate  enterprises.  But 
how  much  worse  is  it,  after  the  field 
of  investment  for  the  savings  of  small 
investors  has  been  narrowed  down  to 
mortgages,  and  mortgage  bonds,  to 
have  a  party  of  demagogues  and  scio- 
lists attack  their  interests  by  this 
proposition : 

To  scale  down  the  Havings  of  six 
million  wage  workers  and  poor  peo- 
ple, and  fonr  to  five  millions  more  of 
people  of  average  means,  by  enab- 
ling? the  borrower*,  including  the 
Srrea  test  and  wealthiest  in  the  land 
to  pay  off  the  debts  in  dollars  of  half 
the  present  standard. 

If  such  a  proposition  were  made 
with  full  comprehension  of  its  meaning, 
it  would  be  the  monumental  crime  of 
the  age.  As  it  is,  we  are  willing  to 
extend  to  it  the  excuse  of  stupendous 
ignorance  and  amazing  misconception. 
*  *  * 

XIX.— The    Cost   of  the   Change. 

Several  articles  in  the  past  have  been 
devoted  to  showing  how  the  proposition 
to  scale  down  debts  by  decreasing  the 
value  of  the  dollar  attacks  the  savings 
and  investments  of  the  masses.  This 
was  based  upon  the  recognition  of  the 
fact  that  when  the  change  was  entirely 
made,  and  all  the  conditions  of  trade 


75 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


readjusted  to  the  lowered  standard,  the 
one  permanent  result  would  be  to  have 
taken  away  from  the  creditor  and  given 
to  the  debtor  the  proportion  of  all  debts 
by  which  the  standard  is  lowered,  in- 
cluding as  a  principal  part  the  $8,000,- 
000,000  of  debts  due  to  building  and  loan 
members,  savings  bank  depositors,  life 
and  insurance  policy  holders,  and  the 
ordinary  depositors  and  stockholders  in 
banks  and  trust  companies,  the  great 
mass  of  whom  are  people  of  ordinary 
means,  and  the  majority  in  number 
people  of  small  means. 

That  free  coinage  means  a  reduction 
of  the  standard  below  the  value  of  gold 
is  evident  not  only  from  the  necessi- 
ties of  the  case,  but  from  the  avowals 
of  the  free  silverites.  They  declare 
that  they  want  a  dollar  which  it  will 
be  easier  for  the  debtor  to  get  to  pay 
debts;  and  if  silver  were  held  as  high 
as  gold,  it  would  be  just  as  hard  to 
earn  the  dollar  as  it  is  now.  They  as- 
sert that  they  wish  to  raise  prices,  and 
the  only  monetary  method  of  raising 
prices  is  to  reduce  the  value  of  the  stan- 
dard. If  we  reduce  the  dollar  to  50  per 
cent  of  its  present  value  all  prices  will 
be  nominally  doubled,  but  their  actual 
value  will  be  unchanged  after  the  re- 
adjustment is  fully  made.  But  let  us 
see  what  will  be  the  case  while  the  ad- 
justment is  going  on. 

It  is  worth  while  to  note  that  the  rise 
that  will  take  place  when  the  standard 
is  reduced  will  be  really  one  only  in 
name,  because  the  same  actual  purchas- 
ing value  of  money  will  be  given  for 
commodities  as  before.  But  the  way  in 
which  the  rise  in  nominal  value  will 
take  place  is  subject  to  some  very  in- 
teresting influences.  The  first  rise  will 
be  in  the  price  of  foreign  commodities, 
imported  into  this  country.  This  rise 
will  be  instantaneous.  If  a  change  in 
the  coinage  reducing  the  dollar  to  half 
its  former  value  were  to  take  place  at 
noon,  the  invoice  of  foreign  merchan- 
dise to  be  paid  for  at  five  minutes  past 
12  must  be  paid  for  in  twice  as  many 
dollars.  It  will  be  worth  no  more.  Say 
that  its  price  was  $10,000  in  gold  before 


the  change;  its  price  will  be  $10,000  in 
gold  after  the  change.  But  that  $10,000 
in  gold  can  only  be  paid  by  $20,000  of 
the  dollars  cheapened  one-half.  As  all 
foreign  commodities  must  be  settled  for 
in  gold,  the  first  and  immediate  effect 
of  a  reduction  of  the  standard  will  be 
to  raise  the  prices  of  all  the  goods  which 
this  country  purchases  from  foreign 
lands  in  exact  proportion  to  the  depreci- 
ation of  the  standard  or  the  nominal  ap- 
preciation of  gold. 

If  this  were  accompanied  by  an  equal- 
ly prompt  rise  in  the  nominal  prices  of 
all  domestic  products  and  services, 
there  would  be  neither  harm  nor  good 
from  it,  except  that  falsification  of  the 
standard  in  which  debts  are  paid.  But 
there  are  many  reasons  why  the  prices 
of  the  domestic  commodities  cannot  ad- 
vance so  quickly.  For  instance,  sup- 
posing a  farmer,  to  secure  advances 
on  his  crops,  has  contracted  to  deliver 
them  to  a  dealer  at  a  fixed  price.  He  is 
a  debtor,  but  he  is  a  debtor  who  is  to 
pay  his  debt  in  commodities  and  re- 
ceive therefore  a  credit  in  money  of 
account;  and  the  money  of  account  will 
be  half  the  value  he  expected  to  re- 
ceive. The  census  report  gives  an  es- 
timate of  crop  liens,  North  and  South, 
of  $400,000,000  to  $500,000,000.  Here  is 
a  factor  of  immense  size  tending  to 
force  the  crops  into  market  to  realize 
the  discharge  of  the  liens  in  the  de- 
preciated money  and  preventing  a  rise 
of  the  products  to  correspond  to  the 
reduction  of  the  standard.  The  portion 
of  the  crops  that  is  exported  will,  when 
they  get  to  the  ultimate  market  abroad, 
be  worth  exactly  the  former  price  in 
gold.  This  will  tend  to  raise  the  nom- 
inal price  in  the  depreciated  currency. 
But  of  $3,500,000,000  agricultural  pro- 
ducts about  $700,000,000  are  exported. 
Of  the  factors  of  demand  therefore  on 
the  products  of  the  very  class  that  is 
most  deluded  by  the  free  silver  sophis- 
try, one-fifth  will  incite  the  advance, 
four-fifths  will  delay  it. 

This  would  be  the  case  under  normal 
conditions;  but  when  it  is  mixed  up 
with  a  convulsion  in  credits,  it  must  be 


.76 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


greatly  aggravated.  We  have  seen  in 
the  statistics  of  prices  heretofore  quoted 
that  the  decline  of  prices  during  three 
years  of  disturbed  credits  rivaled,  and 
in  many  leading  staples  exceeded,  the 
decline  during  the  20  years  of  alleged 
demonetization.  It  is  worth  while 
therefore  to  see  what  the  condition  of 
credits  would  be  during  this  process 
of  raising  prices  by  enacting  that  a 
half  dollar  shall  in  the  future  be  a  dol- 
lar. 

There  are,  in  all,  about  $4,885,000,000 
of  bank  deposits.  Of  these  $3,075,000,- 
000  is  loaned  on  commercial  and  short 
time  paper,  while  $1,810,000,000  is  in- 
vested in  mortgages;  but  the  creditors 
—the  savings  bank  depositors— have 
the  right  to  withdraw  on  a  notice  run- 
ning from  two  weeks  to  three  months. 
Now,  if  these  depositors,  numbering 
over  6,000,000  people,  are  confronted 
with  the  fact  that  at  the  given  time  their 
deposits  of  about  $800  each,  are  payable 
on  the  gold  basis,  but  that  six  or  nine 
months  later  they  will  be  payable  in 
coin  of  half  value,  what  will  they  do? 
Will  they  sit  idly  by  and  suffer  the 
loss  of  half  their  savings?  Those  of 
them  who  are  too  ignorant  to  under- 
stand the  change  will  do  so;  and  in 
such  cases  the  result  will  be  that,  as 
is  always  the  case  in  such  fluctuations, 
the  unwary  and  uninformed  suffer  the 
loss,  while  the  sharp  and  unscrupulous 
not  only  escape  it,  but  reap  all  the  ad- 
vantages that  are  to  be  gained.  But  the 
knowledge  of  the  impending  change 
will  be  general  enough  to  start  an  im- 
mense demand  from  these  depositors 
for  gold  or  gold  value.  To  meet  this 
demand  the  banks  must  call  in  their 
loans;  merchants  and  manufacturers 
must  liquidate;  transactions  must  be  im- 
peded, the  liquidations  of  1873  and  1893 
are  only  a  premonition  of  what  must 
take  place  if  such  a  preannounced  and 
deliberate  lowering  of  the  standard 
were  enacted. 

Not  only  would  the  wiping  out  of 
the  credit  by  which  the  daily  move- 
ments of  trade  are  carried  on  be  inevi- 


table, but  the  shock  to  the  public  faith 
and  credit  would  be  one  from  which 
it  would  take  years  to  recover.  By 
maintaining  good  faith  and  a  stable 
currency  we  have  made  money  abund- 
ant on  good  security  and  interest  rates 
cheap.  But  with  the  experience  that 
the  nation  deliberately  enacted  a  scal- 
ing down  of  debts  on  account  of  an  al- 
leged and  fancied  injustice  of  23  years 
before,  will  lenders  be  willing  to  go  on 
lending  subject  to  the  hazard  of  a  new 
attack  by  demagogical  schemes?  Could 
we  blame  the  savings  bank  depositor 
who  finds  half  his  savings  surrepti- 
tiously taken  away  from  him,  if  he 
should  conclude  that  after  all  the  ex- 
ample of  the  thrifty  French  peasant, 
who  hoards  his  savings  in  some  hiding 
place,  is  the  wisest  one?  It  took  20  or 
30  years  for  this  country  to  recover  from 
the  effects  of  the  State  repudiations  in 
the  first  half  of  the  century.  Some  of 
the  Southern  States  which  scaled  down 
their  debts  of  the  reconstruction  and 
war  period  have  not  recovered  from  it 
yet.  How  many  decades  would  it  take 
for  the  United  States  to  recover  from 
the  loss  of  credit  and  good  name  due 
to  a  universal  scaling  down  of  debts 
by  national  authority  under  the  guid- 
ance of  a  party  pledged  to  that  meas- 
ure of  dishonor? 

Now,  while  banks,  merchants  and 
manufacturers  were  liquidating,  while 
industry  was  standing  still  and  labor 
was  idle  and  starving,  how  much  ad- 
vance could  there  be  in  the  price  of 
domestic  products;  and  how  long  would 
it  take  during  the  years  of  recovery  for 
domestic  products  to  rise  to  the  same 
level  as  the  advance  in  the  foreign 
products?  They  would  eventually  re- 
adjust themselves,  but  while  the  pro- 
cess was  going  on  the  loss  would  be 
an  enormous  one.  The  poverty  of  the 
people  would  reduce  the  consumption 
of  foreign  products;  but  what  they  con- 
sumed they  would  have  to  pay  more 
for,  measured  in  their  own  products. 

This  is  the  statistical  history  of  ev- 
ery depreciation  of  a  nation's  currency, 
with  one  exception.  There  never  has 


77 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


been  a  case  of  a  deliberate  and  prean- 
nounced  movement  of  depreciation,  such 
as  this  would  be,  if  the  free  silver  par- 
ty were  to  succeed.  Consequently,  the 
necessity  of  a  universal  liquidation  and 
suspension  of  operations  through  the 
previous  knowledge  of  the  change,  has 
never  been  encountered.  Nations  have 
gone  to  a  depreciated  basis  heretofore, 
because  they  could  not  help  them- 
selves, and  so  the  preliminary  convul- 
sion has  been  escaped.  But  the  unvary- 
ing rule  of  the  change  has  been  that 
in  such  circumstances  the  prices  of  for- 
eign products,  rose  to  the  extent  of  the 
depreciation  first,  the  prices  of  domes- 
tic products  followed  at  a  respectful  dis- 
tance, and  the  rate  of  wages  rose  in 
proportion  last  of  all. 

This  vital  and  crucial  fact  that  the 
wage-earner  would  be  the  heaviest  loser 
from  the  change  is  testified  to  by  uni- 
versal experience.  The  wage-earner 
must  lose,  first,  by  the  suspension  of 
industry;  and,  second,  by  the  law  of 
nature  that  his  class  is  the  last  to  find 
out  that  the  money  in  which  he  is  paid 
will  purchase  less  than  formerly,  and 
the  one  who  has  most  difficulty  in  ad- 
vancing the  price  of  that  which  he 
has  to  sell.  The  silver  men  practically 
admit  this  in  their  references  to  India 
and  China,  although  they  are  not  clear- 
minded  enough  to  perceive  the  force  of 
their  admission.  They  say  that  these 
silver  countries  are  able  to  produce 
their  staple  commodities  at  the  old 
price,  and  thus  undersell  the  United 
States.  That  can  only  be  true  on  the 
hypothesis  that  wages  have  not  risen, 
in  proportion  to  the  depreciation  of  sil- 
ver; which  gives  the  silver  movement 
the  peculiar  guise  of  a  proposition  to 
bring  American  labor  down  to  some- 
thing resembling  the  level  of  the  In- 
dian and  Chinese  laborers.  The  fact 
is  that  Indian  labor  has  risen  some- 
what. During  the  20  years  in  which  it 
should  have  risen  nearly  100  per  cent 
to  equal  the  depreciation  of  the  rupee, 
Indian  wages  have  risen  50  per  cent, 
making  an  actual  depreciation  of  25 
per  cent  in  the  purchasing  power  of 


these  wages.  Possibly  Chinese  labor 
is  so  ignorant,  and  abject  that  its  wages 
have  not  risen  at  all  in  silver,  or,  what 
is  equivalent,  have  declined  50  per  cent 
in  purchasing  power.  Exactly  the  same 
experience  is  testified  to  from  Brazil, 
Colombia  and  other  South  American 
countries,  where  prices  and  the  cost  of 
living  have  advanced  100  to  200  per 
cent  by  the  depreciation  of  the  money, 
but  wages  have  increased  only  50  to 
60  per  cent.  We  think  American  labor 
is  too  intelligent  and  free  to  let  its 
wages  drag  along  15  or  20  years  with- 
out rising  in  proportion  to  the  lessen- 
ed standard;  but  that  it  will  take  con- 
siderable time  to  bring  it  up  is  evi- 
denced by  one  illustration  from  the  his- 
tory of  this  country. 

Thirty-three  years  ago  the  country 
went  to  a  depreciated  currency  basis. 
At  one  time  its  dollar  was  worth,  in 
purchasing  power,  35  per  cent  of  the 
gold  dollar.  Did  wages  advance  in  pro- 
portion, so  that  they  were  three  times 
in  1864  what  they  were  in  1861?  On  the 
contrary,  they  did  not  keep  up  to  the 
advance  in  prices,  while  prices  could 
not  quite  keep  up  to  the  fluctuations 
in  gold.  The  statistics  of  the  period 
1860  to  1866  show  that  prices  calculated 
in  paper  money  had  risen  116  per  cent, 
while  wages  advanced  43  per  cent. 
There  was  the  stimulant  to  wages,  that 
a  million  men  were  employed  under 
arms  in  putting  down  the  rebellion; 
but,  even  with  that  stimulant,  labor 
four  years  after  the  nominal  rise  in 
gold,  measuring  the  depreciation  in 
currency,  had  to  pay  more  than  double 
prices  for  everything  it  bought  and  got 
only  43  per  cent  advance  in  wages.  The 
actual  meaning  of  this  was  that  for 
a  period  of  at  least  four  years  wages 
were  reduced  one-third  by  reason  of 
the  depreciation  of  the  currency  in 
which  it  was  paid. 

This  reduction  of  wages  by  paying 
them  in  an  inferior  dollar  is  the  bene- 
fit to  which  the  free  silver  demagogues 
invite  the  workingmen  of  the  country. 
It  is  the  overwhelming  fact  that  the 
free  coinage  proposition  proposes  some- 


78 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


thing  which,  if  it  should  be  done,  would 
produce  an  immense  convulsion  in  the 
process  of  which  the  two  classes  to 
which  these  sciolists  address  their 
sophistry,  the  farmers  and  wage-work- 
ers, would  be  the  heaviest  and  most 
universal  losers.  The  speculators  and 
manipulators  would  reap  their  harvest. 
Bankers  and  merchants  by  foreseeing 
the  change  can  take  precautions  to  min- 
imize their  loss;  but  the  common  peo- 
ple are  to  suffer  both  by  having  their 
earnings  scaled  down,  and  by  having 
the  much-vaunted  rise  in  prices  take 
the  form  of  a  rise  in  what  the  people 
have  to  buy,  while  the  corresponding 
rise  in  what  they  produce  must  be 
much  delayed,  if  not  indefinitely  post- 
poned. 

The  cost  of  the  change  therefore 
would  be: 

A  convulsion  of  credit  and  stagna- 
tion of  industry  and  commerce. 

Immediate  rise  of  imported  com- 
modities  in  the  depreciated  currency 
and  a  slower  rise  in  domestic  com- 
modities, making:  the  people  pay 
more  for  what  they  buy  than  they 
receive  for  what  they  produce. 

Loss  of  wages  to  labor,  first 
through  suspension  of  industry  and, 
second,  from  the  payment  of  wages 
in  depreciated  money. 

*     *     * 
XX.— Standards  and  Savings. 

Over  a  week  ago  The  Dispatch  in- 
vited discussion  by  its  free  silver  cor- 
respondents of  the  two  following  ques- 
tions, as  crucial  ones  in  the  discus- 
sion of  free  silver  coinage: 

First— Since  the  monetary  demand  of 
the  whole  world  for  gold  could  not 
prevent  its  depreciation  in  purchasing 
power  from  1850  to  1865,  when  it  was 
the-  more  abundant  metal,  what  reason 
is  there  to  hope  that  the  United  States 
Government,  by  its  solitary  and  unaid- 
ed action,  can  raise  the  price  of  the 
whole  world's  stock  of  silver  when  it 
has  been  the  more  abundant  metal? 

Second — If,  on  account  of  an  alleged 
advance  in  the  purchasing  power  of 
gold,  due  to  demonetization  of  silver  23 


years  ago,  it  is  proposed  to  scale  down 
debts  by  reducing  the  standard  through 
free  coinage,  what  excuse  is  there  in 
justice  or  reason  for  scaling  down  the 
debts  of  the  past  10  years,  contracted 
on  the  gold  basis,  and  which  constitute 
over  three-quarters  of  the  present  out- 
standing total  debt? 

Not  a  single  answer  has  been  re- 
ceived to  either  of  these  questions. 

Both  of  them  are  vital  in  the  two 
branches  of  the  discussion  to  which 
they  respectively  belong.  Other  argu- 
ments are  almost  equally  conclusive, 
but  these  have  the  importance  of  com- 
pressing each  within,  a  single  point  a 
clear  demonstration  of  the  matter  at 
issue.  The  first  conclusively  settles  the 
point  whether  free  coinage  would  re- 
duce the  value  of  the  dollar  to  the  mar- 
ket level  of  silver  bullion,  or  would 
raise  the  market  level  of  silver  bullion 
to  the  present  value  of  the  dollar.  Dur- 
ing the  period  from  1850  to  1870,  the 
production  of  gold  was  multiplied  by 
four,  and  notwithstanding  the  mone- 
tary demand  of  the  whole  world,  the 
purchasing  power  of  gold,  with  all  other 
influences  considered,  decreased  25  per 
cent.  During  the  period  from  1870  to 
the  present  date  the  production  of  sil- 
ver has  been  similarly  multiplied  and 
it  has  depreciated  46  to  47  per  cent, 
measured  in  gold.  The  comparison  of 
the  two  great  monetary  events  points 
straight  to  the  conclusion  that  of  this 
depreciation  25  per  cent  is  due  to  the 
increased  production,  and  of  the  re- 
maining discrepancy  between  gold  and 
silver,  10  to  11  per  cent  is  due  to  the 
disuse  of  silver  by  European  nations, 
and  10  to  11  per  cent  is  the  advance 
in  gold  due  to  the  increased  demand 
for  European  coinage.  This  conclusion 
is  verified  by  the  fact  already  shown 
that  the  decline  in  prices,  after  allow- 
ing for  the  special  causes  of  improve- 
ments in  machinery,  methods  of  pro- 
duction and  transportation,  is  just 
about  10  per  cent.  The  Dispatch  has 
repeatedly  propounded  this  question 
from  an  early  stage  in  the  discussion, 
but  no  advocate  of  free  silver  has  ever 


79 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


attempted  to  answer  it.  It  is  decisive 
proof  that  what  the  whole  world  could 
not  do  with  gold,  the  United  States 
alone  cannot  do  with  silver,  and  that 
free  silver  coinage  means  the  deprecia- 
tion of  the  standard  by  about  40  per 
cent  of  the  present  value. 

This  point  having  been  practically 
settled,  that  the  depreciation  of  the 
standard  means  the  scaling  down  of  the 
debt  to  be  paid  in  the  depreciated  stan- 
dard, the  second  question  becomes  vital- 
ly pertinent.  On  account  of  the  al- 
leged advance  in  standard,  proved  by 
statistical  inquiry  to  be  about  10  per 
cent,  but  alleged  to  be  100  per  cent,  it 
is  proposed  to  cut  debts  in  two.  Aside 
from  the  other  monstrous  features  of 
this  proposition  in  attacking  the  sav- 
ings of  the  poor,  in  overturning  credit 
and  paralyzing  industry,  the  question 
forces  itself  into  the  discussion.  What 
justification  is  there  in  visiting,  on  ac- 
count of  an  alleged  hardship  inflicted 
on  debtors  23  years  ago,  a  much  greater 
and  deliberate  injustice  on  an  entirely 
separate  volume  of  business  and  indus- 
trial loans  of  the  present  date? 

The  fact  is  that  in  estimating  the  vol- 
ume of  present  debt  that  has  been  con- 
tracted within  the  past  10  years  at  75 
per  cent  of  the  total,  The  Dispatch 
understated  the  fact.  Of  the  $19,000,- 
000,000  estimated  debt  of  the  country, 
$5,000,000,000  is  of  the  class  which  does 
not  run  over  a  year  or  two,  and  if  over 
five  years  old  is  a  bad  debt.  Of  the 
$5,669,000,000  railway  mortgages,  one- 
fourth  was  contracted  in  the  past  five 
years,  and  six-tenths  in  the  past  10 
years.  Of  the  street  railway,  telegraph, 
telephone,  light,  heat  and  power  com- 
panies' debt,  over  one-half  is  of  the  past 
five  years,  and  eight-tenths  of  the  past 
10  years.  Of  real  estate  mortgages,  75 
per  cent  was  incurred  in  the  past  five 
years  and  90  per  cent  within  10  years. 
Of  government  debt,  three-eighths  has 
been  incurred  within  five  years.  Of 
other  public  debt,  about  one-third  is 
dated  within  five  years  past,  and  two- 
thirds  within  10  years.  Thus,  of  the 
total  of  $19,000,000,000,  there  is  $12,- 


500,000,000  that  was  contracted  within 
the  past  five  years,  and  $15,000,000,000 
within  10  years.  All  of  the  latter 
amount  was  contracted  on  the  gold 
basis.  The  amount  that  it  can  have 
suffered  by  the  alleged  appreciation  of 
gold  is  a  very  slight  percentage  of  the 
whole,  and  not  half  the  gain  that  has 
come  from  the  reduction  in  interest 
rates.  We  do  not  blame  our  free  silver 
friends  for  neglecting  to  answer  the 
question,  what  reason  or  justice  there 
is  in  cutting  down  this  vast  total  of 
debt,  including  savings  bank  deposits, 
building  and  loan  shares  and  life  in- 
surance policies.  The  question  is  un- 
answerable save  by  a  frank  admission 
that  the  entire  proposition  is  a  mon- 
strous example  of  unreason  and  blind 
injustice. 

These  two  questions  having  been 
propounded  without  answer,  we  shall 
consider  ourselves  at  liberty  to  close 
the  discussion  next  week  by  two  ar- 
ticles showing  the  general  conclusions 
from  the  established  and  undisputed 
facts.  We  closed  the  general  contro- 
versy by  communications  a  week  ago, 
but  prior  to  summing  up  we  have  deem- 
ed it  proper  to  publish  three,  which  ap- 
pear elsewhere. 

The  question  of  "Student,"  whether 
an  international  agreement  concerning 
coinage  would  not  be  likely  to  be  abro- 
gated by  war,  and  whether  that  would 
not  be  "highly  dangerous,"  permits  of 
two  or  three  answers.  This  country 
has  the  same  system  of  weights  ami 
measures  as  England;  but  through  two 
wars  it  never  occurred  to  either  power 
that  it  could  injure  the  other  by 
changing  the  weights  or  measures.  Gov- 
ernments engaged  in  the  struggle  of 
war  very  often  demonetize  all  coined 
money,  so  far  as  their  realms  are  con- 
cerned, by  the  suspension  of  specie 
payments;  but  that  does  not  injure  the 
opposing  government  at  all.  The  gov- 
ernment engaged  in  war  tries  to  keep 
up  specie  payments  as  long  as  it  can, 
and  the  last  thing  it  would  do,  if  it 
had  a  monetary  system  of  both  silver 
and  gold,  would  be  to  demonetize  either, 


80 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


so  long  as  it  could  keep  up  specie  pay- 
ments in  either  or  both.  One  of  the 
strongest  inducements,  for  an  interna- 
tional agreement  on  bimetalism  among 
the  continental  nations,  is  that  it  would 
permit  them  to  add  their  silver  stock 
to  their  reserve  of  money  held  to  pro- 
vide for  the  possible  European  war.  We 
hope  these  facts  will  show  our  cor- 
respondent that  as  international  bimet- 
alism rests  on  the  power  of  commerce 
between  the  nations  to  give  a  uniform 
value  to  the  monetary  metals,  a  war  by 
which  the  commerce  between  the  two 
belligerent  nations  would  be  suspended 
would  make  it  impossible  for  one  nation 
to  injure  the  other,  either  by  demone- 
tizing gold  or  silver,  or  by  suspending 
specie  payments  altogether. 

The  question  of  "J.  S."  with  refer- 
ence to  the  fact,  brought  out  in  The 
Dispatch  the  other  day,  that  the  free 
silver  proposition  of  paying  in  cheaper 
dollars  attacks  savings  bank  deposits, 
on  the  supposition  that  they  are  pre- 
sented as  arguments  on  the  free  silver 
side,  display  a  clever  impudence  that 
is  refreshing.  Our  correspondent  is 
evidently  too  intelligent  a  man  to  sup- 
pose that  his  propositions  are  fair  argu- 
ment; but  the  communication  deserves 
publication  as  an  example  of  bracing 
assurance. 

The  questions  are,  whether  savings 
banks  are  honest  from  a  sense  of  prin- 
ciple or  only  as  honest  as  the  law  al- 
lows; whether  strict  honesty  will  not 
require  the  savings  bank  to  pay  its  de- 
positors in  100  cent  dollars,  after  the 
law  allows  them  to  be  paid  in  50-cent 
dollars,  and  to  pay  the  extra  price  for 
the  gold  necessary  to  do  so ;  and  wheth- 
er the  plea  that  they  cannot  get  the 
gold  does  not  show  that  the  supply  of 
gold  is  inadequate. 

These  questions  first  ignore  the  fact 
that  about  half  of  the  savings  deposits 
of  the  country  are  in  savings  banks 
having  no  capital  stock.  In  these  in- 
stitutions the  depositors  are  directly 
the  owners  of  the  mortgages  and  secur- 
ities in  which  their  savings  are  in- 
vested. If  the  law  permits  these  mort- 


gages and  securities  to  be  paid  in  50- 
cent  dollars,  amounting  to  about  $900,- 
000,000,  it  would  devolve  on  our  cor- 
respondent to  show  the  2,400,000  people 
thus  defrauded  out  of  half  their  savings 
how  they  can  recompense  themselves 
by  going  to  some  outside  source  to 
raise  from  their  own  resources  the 
$450,000,000  of  gold  to  repay  themselves 
the  loss  inflicted  on  them  by  the  law. 

With  regard  to  the  other  half,  in 
which  savings  banks  having  capital 
stock  are  responsible  to  the  depositors, 
it  is  a  pertinent  answer  to  our  cor- 
respondent's question  to  say,  first,  that 
corporations,  being  entirely  creatures 
of  the  law,  are  very  apt  to  conform  to 
the  standard  of  honesty  established  by 
the  law,  and  to  ask,  second,  whether 
the  people  expect  savings  banks  to  be 
more  honest  to  them  than  they  declare 
by  law  that  they  will  be  to  the  savings 
banks.  But  those  answers  are  not 
complete,  in  view  of  one  fact  which  is 
entirely  ignored  by  the  inquiry. 

That  is,  that  the  action  of  the  law 
will  not  permit  the  savings  banks,  al- 
though they  should  wish  it,  to  do  any- 
thing else  than  pay  their  depositors  in 
the  cheaper  dollars.  The  savings  banks 
have  in  round  numbers  $2,000,000,000  of 
resources.  Of  that  sum  one-tenth  be- 
longs to  the  shareholders,  in  capital  and 
surplus,  and  nine-tenths  belong  to  the 
depositors.  Practically  all  of  it  is  in- 
vested in  mortgages  and  bonds.  Now, 
when  the  law  allows  those  mortgages 
and  bonds  to  be  paid  in  50-cent  dollars, 
the  value  of  the  two  thousand  million 
of  assets  is  reduced  to  $1,000,000,000 
measured  in  the  old  standard.  If  the 
savings  banks  should  attempt  to  pay 
in  gold  their  whole  resources  would  on- 
ly pay  $1,000,000,000  out  of  the  $1,800,- 
000,000  deposits.  If  our  correspondent 
can  indicate  a  process  by  which  the 
$200,000,000  belonging  to  the  banks,  al- 
ready exhausted  when  the  $1,000,000,- 
000  was  paid  in  gold,  can  be  ex- 
panded to  purchase  $800,000,000  more 
gold  to  make  the  depositors  whole,  he 
knows  a  secret  of  unbounded  wealth, 
that  will  make  the  Rothschilds,  Vander- 


81 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


bilts  and  Goulds,  all  rolled  into  a  lump, 
pale  their  diminished  fires. 

The  question  of  the  adequacy  of  the 
gold  supply  has  nothing  to  do  with  this 
point.  There  was  gold  enough  to  per- 
mit these  $1,800,000,000  of  deposits  to  be 
made  on  the  gold  basis.  There  was 
gold  enough  to  permit  that  sum  to  be 
invested  in  mortgages  and  securities, 
so  that  the  depositors  might  get  their 
interest.  There  is  gold  enough  to  in- 
sure that  the  depositors  will  be  paid 
on  the  gold  basis,  as  they  may  want 
their  money,  if  the  free  silver  craze 
does  not  overturn  things.  But  the  point 
is  simply  this:  There  are  $1,800,000,- 
000  of  the  savings  of  the  people  loaned 
by  savings  banks  on  mortgages  and  se- 
curities, just  as  there  are  about  $6,000,- 
000,000  of  other  savings  loaned  in  the 
same  way.  These  savings  the  free  sil- 
ver school  proposes  to  have  paid  in 
cheapened  dollars,  and  that  is  all  that 
these  ten  or  twelve  million  creditors 
can  get  for  their  savings,  if  the  silver 
campaign  is  successful. 


XXI.— Reviewing  the  Facts. 

In  the  series  of  articles  on  the  silver 
question  which  have  been  running  in 
The  Dispatch  since  the  opening  of  June, 
the  chief  purpose  has  been  to  establish 
definitely  the  points  of  fact  on  which 
the  question  must  be  decided,  if  it  is 
decided  by  intelligence.  In  most  cases 
the  settlement  of  a  question  of  fact 
has  carried  with  it  a  very  patent  and 
effective  conclusion  as  to  the  free  sil- 
ver theory;  but  to  base  the  final  conclu- 
sions upon  a  complete  and  comprehen- 
sive view  of  the  actual  facts,  it  is 
well  to  review  the  discussion  and  see 
what  has  been  shown  by  it. 

The  question,  it  should  be  borne  in 
mind,  is  the  proposition  that  the  United 
states  shall  by  its  solitary  action  adopt 
free  silver  coinage.  The  action  of 
other  nations  does  not,  therefore,  prop- 
erly enter  into  the  discussion,  except 
as  it  illustrates  the  results  that  must 
be  expected,  or  shows  causes  to  have 
existed  outside  the  United  States,  which 


the  free  silver  theories  attribute  to  the 
United  States.  In  that  relation  a  good 
deal  of  attention  has  been  given  to 
the  facts  in  other  countries,  and  has 
established  facts  indicating  a  correct 
conclusion  as  to  an  international  policy. 

I. — In  investigating  the  assertion  that 
the  United  States  used  gold  and  silver 
equally  prior  to  1873,  but  that  by  the 
crime  of  1873,  silver  was  stricken  down, 
and  has  been  kept  down  ever  since,  the 
following  facts  have  been  shown: 

1— That  the  act  of  1873  did  not  de- 
monetize a  single  silver  coin  then  in 
monetary  use  by  the  people  of  the 
United  States. 

2 — That  the  real  act  of  demonetizing 
silver  took  place  in  1853,  when  the 
fractional  silver  coin,  which,  up  to  that 
time,  had  been  a  legal  tender,  and  con- 
stituted 97  per  cent  of  all  the  silver 
coined  in  the  country  up  to  1850,  was 
restricted  in  legal  tender  and  denied 
free  coinage. 

3 — That  as  declared  on  the  floor  of 
congress  in  1853,  and  shown  by  mem- 
orials, the  country  was  then  on  a  gold 
standard,  and  the  purpose  of  the  act 
of  1853  was  to  keep.it  on  a  gold  stan- 
dard, retaining  fractional  silver  as  sub- 
sidiary coin,  and  leaving  the  silver  dol- 
lar, of  which  $2,356,000  were  then  coin- 
ed, in  the  words  used  at  that  time,  "as 
an  article  of  merchandise." 

4 — That  the  effect  of  this  act  was  to 
increase  the  coinage  of  silver  for  sub- 
sidiary use,  $59,824,000  being  coined  in 
the  23  years  from  1850  to  1873,  against 
$74,461,000  in  the  53  years  prior  to 
1850;  while  the  fact  that  the  silver 
dollar  was  not  in  monetary  use  prior 
to  the  suspension  of  specie  payments 
is  shown  by  the  fact  that  only  $1,723,- 
770  were  coined  during  the  10  years, 
1853  to  1862,  inclusive. 

5 — That  when  the  act  of  1873  was 
passed  the  country  was  using  neither 
gold  nor  silver,  except  on  the  Pacific 
Coast,  where  silver  was  only  used  for 
small  change;  and  that  the  only  change 
which  that  act  made  in  silver  coinage, 
was  to  substitute  for  the  silver  dol- 
lar which,  up  to  that  date,  had  not 


82 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


been  one-hundredth  part  of  the  total 
coinage  of  the  country,  the  trade  dollar 
of  greater  weight,  to  make  it  more  ad- 
vantageous for  export,  the  only  pur- 
pose for  which  silver  dollars  were  then 
coined  at  all. 

6— That  the  act  of  1873  had  that  ef- 
fect, the  silver  coinage  in  the  subse- 
quent five  years  under  its  provisions  be- 
ing $79,120,000,  against  $9,287,000  for 
the  five  years  prior  to  its  enactment; 
that  the  acts  of  1878  and  subsequent 
legislation  immensely  increased  the 
total  silver  coinage  and  purchase,  being 
$705,000,000  in  23  years  after  1873, 
against  $143,000,000  in  the  80  years  prior 
to  1873;  that  of  silver  dollars  the 
United  States  coined  429,000,000  since 
1873  and  8,000,000  before  1873;  that  of 
the  coinage  of  the  country  greater  than 
fractional  silver  prior  to  1873,  gold 
coin  constituted  99  per  cent,  and  silver 
dollars  just  about  1  per  cent;  that  of 
the  coinage  since  1873  silver  constituted 
nearly  one-third  and  gold  a  little  over 
two-thirds. 

These  facts  show  conclusively  that 
the  allegation  that  the  United  States 
has,  by  its  action  in  1873  and  since, 
struck  down  and  discriminated  against 
silver  is  a  monstrous  fabrication.  The 
act  of  1873  did  nothing  but  provide  for 
the  coinage  that  had  been  in  actual  use 
prior  to  the  suspension  of  specie  pay- 
ments, and  was  then  in  actual  use  in 
California.  It  demonetized  nothing  but 
coin  that  was  not  and  had  never  been 
in  general  use,*  and  it  substituted  for 
it  a  silver  dollar  that  was  coined  in 
the  next  few  years,  at  an  annual  rate 
36  times  that  of  the  silver  dollar  before 
its  passage.  Of  all  silver  coinage  in 
the  United  States  since  1873  the  an- 
nual rate  has  been  17  times  as  great 
as  before  that  year;  and  of  the  silver 
dollars  which  are  the  especial  subject 
of  the  free  silver  grievance  the  an- 
nual coinage  has  been  250  times  as 
great  since  1873  as  before.  In  brief,  sil- 
ver was  not  used  in  the  United  States 
except  as  subsidiary  coinage  prior  to 
1873;  since  then  its  use  has  been  im- 
mensely increased. 


With  regard  to  the  action  of  foreign 
governments  we  have  shown: 

1 — That  by  the  immense  increase  in 
the  production  of  gold,  after  1848  the 
purchasing  power  of  gold  declined.  Gold 
became  the  cheaper  metal. 

2— That  by  this  decline  silver  ad- 
vanced to  a  premium  of  4  to  7  per  cent, 
the  advance  in  commodities  being  much 
greater.  The  force  of  a  policy  of  inter- 
national bimetalism  was  recognized  in 
the  fact  that  while  gold  drove  silver  to 
a  premium  and  out  of  such  bimetallic 
countries  as  France,  silver  did  not  ad- 
vance in  gold  value,  to  the  full  degree 
that  commodities  did. 

3— That  after  this  influence  had  in- 
duced Germany,  Austria  and  some  other 
countries  to  adopt  the  single  silver 
standard,  an  international  movement 
was  started  to  adopt  the  single  gold 
standard;  that  this  movement  was  op- 
posed, and  was  not  generally  adopted; 
but  that  the  silver  standard  countries 
were  so  dissatisfied  with  their  money 
that  they  made  the  change  independ- 
ently. 

4 — That  after  this  movement  had  be- 
gun and  Germany  had  adopted  the  gold 
standard,  the  increased  production  of 
silver  together  with  the  German  de- 
monetization reduced  the  value  of  sil- 
ver so  that  in  1874  it  became  cheaper, 
relatively,  than  gold;  and  that  the 
Latin  Union,  which  undertook  to  sus- 
tain bimetalism,  was  forced  to  limit 
the  coinage  of  silver  in  1874,  and  in 
1878  to  suspend  it  altogether. 

In  these  facts  we  have  recognized  that 
the  action  of  European  Governments 
had  its  influence  concurrently  with  the 
increased  product  of  silver,  in  deprecia- 
ting its  value;  but  we  have  shown  the 
silliness  of  the  slander  that  this  was  a 
conspiracy  of  the  money  kings  as  dis- 
played by  the  fact  that  the  gold  move- 
ment favored  the  adoption  of  what  was 
at  the  time  the  cheaper  and  most  abun- 
dant metal.  The  most  indisputable  fact 
is  that  the  causes  which  have  depreci- 
ated silver  were  entirely  outside  the 
legislation  of  the  United  States,  and 
that  our  government  has  not  affected 


83 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


the  matter  in  any  way  except  (1)  to  re- 
sume specie  payments  in  that  coin, 
which  it  used  before  specie  payments 
were  suspended;  and  (2)  beginning 
with  the  same  date  to  increase  its  coin- 
age o'f  silver  to  an  amount  unheard  of 
in  its  previous  history. 

II.— The  historical  basis  of  the  free 
silver  movement  having  been  shown  to 
be  wildly,  persistently  and  in  one  re- 
spect mendaciously  erroneous,  the 
questions  as  to  what  the  result  of  free 
coinage  would  be,  naturally  come  up. 
The  first  in  legitimate  order  is  that 
with  which  some  of  our  free  silver  con- 
tributors opened  the  discussion,  wheth- 
er free  coinage  by  the  United  States 
alone  will  raise  the  value  of  silver 
bullion  to  our  present  standard,  or 
would  lower  the  standard  to  the  mone- 
tary value  of  the  bullion  in  a  silver  dol- 
lar. The  assertion  of  the  silver  advo- 
cates that  the  Government  and  mone- 
tary demand  for  silver  money  would 
raise  the  price  of  silver  bullion  all 
over  the  world  from  69  cents  to  $1.29 
per  ounce,  in  gold,  was  met  by  the  fol- 
lowing points  of  fact: 

1— The  coinage  demand  of  the  United 
States  for  the  past  20  years  has  been 
17  times  as  great  as  it  was  for  the  en- 
tire period  of  alleged  bimetalism,  and 
the  price  of  silver  has  fallen. 

2 — The  monetary  demand  of  all  the 
South  American  countries,  and  of  the 
vast  populations  of  India  and  China, 
making  a  total  many  times  that  of  the 
population  of  the  United  States,  has  not 
been  able  to  prevent  silver  from  fall- 
ing. 

3— The  monetary  demand  of  the 
whole  world  for  gold  could  not  prevent 
it  from  declining  after  the  immense  in- 
crease in  production,  from  1848  and  dur- 
ing subsequent  years,  by  a  proportion 
indicated  at  about  25  per  cent  in  pur- 
chasing value. 

4 — The  unanswerable  nature  of  this 
point  is  tacitly  admitted  by  the  free 
silver  controversialists  in  the  fact  that 
while  refusing  our  repeated  invitations 
to  discuss  it,  they  proceed  to  declare 
that  they  wish  to  attain  purposes  that 


are  only  attainable  by  cheapening  the 
standard.  They  declare  that  they  wish 
to  raise  prices,  and  the  only  way  in 
which  prices  can  be  raised  through 
coinage  is  the  nominal  one  of  making 
a  cheaper  dollar,  by  having  it  decline 
to  the  value  of  silver  bullion.  They 
declare  that  they  want  a  cheaper  dollar 
so  as  to  make  it  easier  to  pay  debts; 
and  if  free  coinage  made  silver  rise  to 
a  parity  with  gold,  it  would  be  just  as 
hard  to  pay  debts  as  it  now  is. 

III. — In  this  practical  admission  that 
they  want  the  dollar  reduced  to  the 
purchasing  power  of  silver  bullion,  the 
free  silver  advocates  entirely  wipe  out 
of  existence '  their  claim  for  the  need 
of  more  money,  and  put  themselves  out 
of  the  rank  of  bimetalists.  This  makes 
the  proposition  mean: 

1— The  sending  of  gold  to  a  premium 
and  demonetizing  it  by  exactly  the  same 
influence  that  demonetized  silver  from 
1848  to  1870. 

2 — This  would  take  away  over  $600,- 
000,000  of  our  basic  money,  and  leave 
us  with  less  than  600,000,000  of  silver 
dollars,  and  $700,000,000  of  paper,  re- 
duced in  purchasing  power,  and  conse- 
quently able  to  conduct  a  less  total  of 
commercial  transactions.  Thus  it  does 
not  mean  more  money  but  necessitates 
contraction. 

3— This  also  means  that  the  United 
States  would  not  go  to  a  bimetallic 
basis  but  to  the  single  silver  basis.  It 
presents  the  issue  plainly,  so  far  as 
the  United  States  is  concerned,  whether 
we  shall  retain  the  present  gold  basis 
or  descend  to  silver  monometalism. 

IV.— With  regard  to  the  assertion 
that  the  act  of  1873  has  ruined  indus- 
try, and  oppressed  the  producer  by 
causing  a  universal  decline  in  prices, 
we  have  shown: 

1— That  the  period  from  1873  to  1893 
was  one  of  enormous  and  unprecedent- 
ed prosperity  and  growth  of  material 
wealth.  This  prosperity,  which  was 
the  ruling  industrial  characteristic  of 
the  United  States  from  the  beginning 
of  1879  to  the  close  of  1892,  is  measured 
by  the  results  of  statistical  comparison 


84 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


afforded  by  the  census  reports  of  1870 
and  1890,  as  follows: 

An  increase  of  the  total  material 
wealth  of  the  United  States  from  the 
gold  value  of  $24,000,000,000  to  the  gold 
value  of  $65,000,000,000. 

An  increase  of  the  number  of  em- 
ployes in  the  manufacturing  establish- 
ments of  the  United  States  from  2,- 
053,000  to  4,712,000,  and  of  the  total 
wages  paid  them,  from  the  gold  value 
of  $620,000,000  to  $2,253,000,000,  an  in- 
crease of  135  per  cent  in  number  and 
over  250  per  cent  in  wages  paid,  with 
an  increase  of  60  per  cent  in  the  wages 
paid  each  employe. 

An  increase  in  the  products  of  steel 
from  68,000  tons  to  6,114,000  tons. 

An  increase  in  the  product  of  cereals 
from  1,387,000,000  to  3,518,000,000  bush- 
els, and  of  cotton  from  1,307,000,000 
pounds  to  3,564,000,000. 

An  increase  in  the  total  of  improved 
acres  from  188,000,000  to  357,000,000. 

An  increase  of  the  total  production 
of  manufactured  articles  from  $3,385,- 
000,000  to  $9,372,000,000  in  value  and 
several  times  that  in  quantity. 

An  increase  in  the  total  exports  of 
breadstuffs  and  provisions  from  $116,- 
900,000  in  1872  to  $439,609,000  in  1892. 

2 — That  the  reduction  of  prices  which 
has  been  distinctive  of  the  period  has 
in  every  marked  case  been  due  to  spe- 
cial causes  entirely  outside  of  the  in- 
fluence of  coinage.  Leading  examples 
among  them  are: 

The  invention  of  new  machinery  and 
methods  which  permit  the  same  labor 
to  produce  from  two  to  six  times  as 
much  as  formerly. 

The  reduction  in  cost  of  transporta- 
tion, by  which  prices  are  lowered  in  the 
shipping  markets,  without  a  corre- 
sponding decline  at  the  points  of  pro- 
duction. Examples  of  this  are,  that 
wheat  on  the  farms  of  Kansas,  Nebras- 
ka and  Iowa  was  shown  by  the  census 
of  1870  to  range  from  45c  to  48c  in 
gold  value;  and  that  of  the  decline  in 
the  value  of  wheat  in  New  York,  just 
19c  per  bushel  is  the  decline  in  freight 


rates  between  Chicago  and  New  York 
alone. 

The  immense  multiplication  in  pro- 
duction shown  by  the  figures  quoted 
above,  and  the  addition  of  new  fields 
of  production  of  the  staples  affected  in 
other  parts  of  the  world. 

3— The  favorite  assertion  of  the  sil- 
verites  that  silver  will  purchase  as 
much  of  everything  now  as  it  did  in 
1873  has  been  shown  to  be  an  utter  and 
complete  error.  It  will  not  even  pur- 
chase as  much  wheat  on  the  farms  of 
Kansas  and  Nebraska  as  it  would  then. 
It  will  not  purchase  as  much  corn, 
pork,  coal,  leather,  coffee,  eggs  or 
cheese.  Out  of  38  articles  quoted  in 
the  Statistical  Abstract  of  the  United 
States  for  that  period,  there  are  only 
seven  in  which  the  percentage  of  de- 
cline has  been  as  great  or  greater  than 
that  of  silver. 

4— After  excluding  the  staples  in 
which  the  decline  is  manifestly  due  to 
improved  processes,  or  the  opening  of 
vast  and  new  fields  of  production,  the 
comparison  of  American  prices  with 
such  European  authority  as  Soetbeer 
shows  that  the  decline  in  prices  of  gen- 
eral staples  indicates  an  appreciation 
in  gold  of  about  10  per  cent. 

5 — While  the  decline  in  prices  due  to 
improvement,  concurrently  with  the  ad- 
vance in  wages  and  the  increase  in  ma- 
terial wealth,  is  the  leading  character- 
istic of  the  alleged  20  years  of  demone- 
tization from  1873  to  1893,  the  three 
years  since  the  latter  date  have  shown 
prostration  and  the  decline  of  both 
prices  and  wages  due  to  tariff  tinkering, 
and  the  disturbance  of  credit  due  to  the 
free  silver  threat.  Three  years  of  dis- 
turbed credit  have  done  -more  injury 
than  20  years  of  the  gold  basis. 

V.— With  regard  to  the  assertion 
that  the  increase  of  the  standard  has 
increased  the  amount  that  the  debtor 
must  pay,  and  that  the  injury  to  pros- 
perity has  increased  the  total  of  debts, 
we  have  shown: 

1 — That  the  total  of  recorded  public 
debt  decreased  between  1870  and  1890, 
from  $3,275,000,000  to  $2,027,000,000. 


85 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


That  the  amount  of  corporate  and  bus- 
iness debt  on  which  there  are  statistics 
for  comparison  increased  from  $2,880,- 
000,000  to  $8,746,000,000.  In  other 
words,  the  debt  which  represented 
wasted  wealth  was  paid  off;  while  the 
debt  which  represents  the  investment 
in  the  means  of  producing  more  wealth 
has  enlarged. 

2 — That  the  calculation  by  the  Census 
Bureau  of  a  total  of  debt  of  $19,000,- 
000,000  for  1890  indicates  at  least  a  total 
of  $10,000,000,000  for  the  same  debt  in 
1870. 

3 — That  therefore  the  increase  of  debt 
for  the  two  decades  was  not  quite  one- 
quarter  the  total  increase  of  wealth 
from  $24,000,000,000  in  1870,  to  $65,000,- 
000,000  in  1890. 

4 — That  the  utmost  possible  founda- 
tion for  the  assertion  that  debts  have 
been  increased  by  the  advance  in  the 
purchasing  power  of  gold  permits  an 
allowance  of  an  increase  of  two-thirds 
of  one  per  cent  annually;  while  the 
gain  to  debtors  in  the  decreased  rate 
of  interest  from  high  public  credit  and 
stable  basis  of  values  has  been  from 
2  to  4  per  cent  annually. 

VI. — Incidentalto  the  general  sub- 
ject of  the  alleged  debts  of  the  nation, 
and  the  lack  of  prosperity,  two  favor- 
ite assertions  of  the  free  silver  men 
have  been  examined. 

1 — The  declaration  that  this  country 
owes  $5,000,000,000  in  securities  held 
abroad,  and  has  to  ship  $200,000,000 
of  gold  abroad  annually  to  pay  the  in- 
terest on  them,  has  been  shown  to  be 
a  complete  figment  of  the  imagination 
by  the  fact  that  for  18  years  prior  to 
1895  the  net  gold  movement  was  about 
$6,000,000  in  favor  of  the  United  States, 
and  that  during  the  same  time  the 
United  States  exported  a  balance  of 
merchandise,  which  by  statistical  cal- 
culation reduced  the  $1,500,000,000  of 
securities  held  abroad  in  1876  to  be- 
tween $500,000,000  and  $1,000,000,000. 

2 — The  assertion  that  the  period  of 
demonetization  has  fallen  with  especial 
hardship  on  the  Western  agricultural 
and  mining  States  is  disproved  by  the 


census  statistics,  showing  that  while 
the  average  per  capita  wealth  in  the 
United  States  increased  from  $780  in 
1870  to  $1,036  in  1890,  the  least  increase 
in  any  of  these  States  was  in  Minne- 
sota, from  $666  to  $1,087,  while  in  others 
it  goes  much  higher,  to  a  maximum  in 
Montana  from  $737  to  $3,427. 

VII.— With  regard  to  the  proposition 
to  reduce  the  standard  in  order  that 
it  may  be  easier  to  pay  debts,  we  have 
shown: 

1 — That  it  is  a  proposition  that  be- 
cause a  limited  and  unintentional  hard- 
ship may  have  been  inflicted  on  a  cer- 
tain body  of  debts  existing  in  1873,  it 
is  now  proposed  to  inflict  a  greater  and 
intentional  hardship  on  another  total  of 
debts  existing  in  1896.  Of  the  total  of 
debts  now  existing,  not  10  per  cent  was 
in  existence  in  1873. 

2— According  to  the  utmost  statistic- 
al calculation,  the  debt  which  has  ex- 
isted from  1873  to  the  present  has 
been  subject  to  an  appreciation  of  gold, 
not  above  15  per  cent,  while  the  free 
silver  proposition  is  to  scale  down  by 
40  to  50  per  cent  a  total  of  debt  over 
three-quarters  of  which  has  been  con- 
tracted in  the  past  10  years.  The  free 
silver  men  say  that  they  wish  debts 
paid  in  the  standard  in  which  they 
were  contracted,  but  they  propose  to 
take  a  total  of  debt  of  which  90  per 
cent  was  contracted  on  the  gold  basis, 
and  to  transfer  it  to  the  silver  basis. 

3— In  attacking  the  interests  of  the 
creditors,  for  the  supposed  benefit  of 
the  debtors,  they  propose  to  scale  down 
the  savings  of  the  following  classes 
of  the  common  people: 

The  depositors  in  savings  banks 
numbering  4,875,000  and  having  savings 
lent  out  at  interest  to  the  amount  of 
$1,810,000,000. 

The  members  of  building  and  loan 
associations  numbering  1,745,000  and 
having  savings  invested  in  mortgages 
of  $450,000,000. 

The  holders  of  life  insurance  poli- 
cies numbering  about  1,200,000,  with 
invested  savings  of  $1,156,000,000. 

The  members  of  fraternal  and  bene- 


86 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


ficial  orders  estimated  at  2,500,000  to 
3,000,000,  whose  payments  to  the  or- 
ders made  on  the  gold  basis  are  to  be 
returned  to  them  scaled  down  to  the 
silver  standard. 

The  holders  of  fire  insurance  policies 
estimated  at  about  1,800,000  with  invest- 
ments due  them  of  $1,352,000,000. 

The  pensioners  of  the  United  States 
numbering  956,000,  with  annuities 
amounting  to  $156,000,000. 

The  depositors  in  banks  not  business 
borrowers,  and  the  stockholders  in 
banks,  together  with  small  investors 
outside  of  corporate  agencies,  estimat- 
ed at  3,000,000  to  4,000,000. 

4 — While  these  large  classes  include, 
in  the  majority,  wage-earners  and  peo- 
ple of  small  means  and  property,  it  has 
been  shown  that  the  people  who  bor- 
row from  these  classes  have  more  prop- 
erty and  larger  means  than  the  real 
lenders.  The  free  silver  proposition  is, 
therefore,  to  take  away  a  portion  of  the 
savings  of  the  poor  and  frugal  and  give 
it  to  the  borrowers  who  are  better  off. 

VIII.— The  proposition  to  increase 
prices  by  cheapening  the  dollar  has 
been  shown  to  involve  the  following 
facts: 

1 — The  increase  of  prices  by  any  such 
means  is  purely  nominal.  A  bushel  of 
wheat  is  now  worth  63  cents  in  New 
York,  because  it  is  worth  5s  Id  in  Liver- 
pool, both  gold  values.  By  having  the 
value  of  the  dollar  cut  in  two  it  may  be 
made  worth  $1.26  in  New  York  in  the  de- 
preciated standard,  but  that  there  will 
be  no  increase  in  actual  value  is  shown 
in  the  fact  that  it  will  be  worth  the 
same  5s  Id  in  Liverpool. 

2 — That  the  operation  of  the  change 
of  a  single  nation  from  one  standard  to 
another  is  shown  to  be  that  imported 
products  always  rise  first,  because  they 
have  to  be  paid  for,  on  arrival,  in  gold. 
The  proposition  is  therefore  that  the 
American  people  must  pay  higher  prices 
for  all  foreign  staples  for  an  indefinite 
period,  before  their  products  will  rise 
in  proportion. 

3 — That  this  rise  in  domestic  products 
will  be  seriously  delayed  by  the  con- 


vulsion in  credits  which  would  follow 
the  fore-knowledge  that  a  change  would 
be  made,  necessitating  the  calling  in  of 
bank  loans,  the  stoppage  of  industry 
and  the  restriction  of  consumption  to 
the  narrowest  limits. 

4— That  the  last  thing  of  all  to  rise 
in  proportion  to  the  inflation  of  prices 
due  to  a  lowered  monetary  standard,  is 
the  wages  of  labor.  Five  examples  have 
been  cited  in  which  the  advance  of 
prices  from  this  cause  has  been  100 
per  cent,  while  wages  in  five  to  ten 
years  have  advanced  only  40  to  50  per 
cent.  The  free  coinage  proposition  to 
labor  is,  therefore,  to  exchange  its  60 
per  cent  increase  of  wages  under  the 
gold  standard,  for  a  25  to  35  per  cent 
decrease,  by  being  paid  in  a  cheaper 
dollar. 

With  these  points  of  fact  fully  dem- 
onstrated, as  they  have  been,  our  read- 
ers may  be  able  to  form  their  own 
opinions.  It  will,  however,  be  perti- 
nent to  close  the  discussion  with  a  gen- 
eral statement  of  the  monetary  policy 
that  can  be  logically  and  justly  found- 
ed on  these  indisputable  premises. 
*  *  * 

XXII.— Tlie   Demands   of  Integrity. 

Every  intelligent  man  who  has  giv- 
en attention  to  the  question  of  the  mon- 
etary standard  must  agree  that  the 
first  and  main  purpose  of  the  standard 
of  values  must  be  that  it  shall  be  sub- 
ject to  as  little  change  as  possible. 
Like  any  other  measure,  to  either  ex- 
pand or  contract  it  is  a  violation  of  the 
very  reason  of  its  existence.  If  the 
yardstick  is  either  stretched  or  shrunk- 
en intentionally,  it  is  a  sign  of  dishon- 
esty; if  a  merchant  should  be  found 
with  a  bushel  basket  in  his  store  hav- 
ing a  movable  bottom,  he  would  be  set 
down  as  a  thief.  No  one  can  fully  es- 
timate the  injustice  and  wrong  that 
can  be  inflicted  by  a  changeable  yard- 
stick or  bushel  measure.  By  how 
much  less  can  the  human  mind  grasp 
the  vast  injustice  that  is  done  by  shift- 
ing a  measure  of  values  that  may  viti- 
ate every  transaction  of  trade  and  ev- 
ery payment  of  obligations. 


87 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


A  measure  of  length  must  have 
length;  a  measure  of  space  or  quan- 
tity must  contain  space;  a  measure  of 
gravity  must  have  its  own  gravity  or 
weight;  and  a  measure  of  value  must 
have  its  value.  But  while  material 
science  has  easily  found  measures  of 
length,  quantity  and  weight,  containing 
those  qualities,  which  do  not  vary  ap- 
preciably, monetary  science  has  not 
yet  discovered  a  measure  of  values 
which  is  not  subject  to  the  changes  in 
its  own  value  by  the  altering  condi- 
tions of  demand  and  supply.  The  re- 
corded experience  of  the  world  is  that 
the  use  of  gold  and  silver  reduces  these 
fluctuations  to  a  minimum;  and  the 
clear  purpose  of  just  and  enlightened 
monetary  science  must  be  to  reduce  the 
changes  in  the  measure  of  values  to  the 
least  possible  degree,  to  make  those 
that  cannot  be  foreseen  or  avoided  as 
gradual  and  harmless  as  possible. 

It  should  also  be  understood  that  the 
injury   or   injustice     wrought     by     a 
change  in  the  standard  is  solely  in  vit- 
ating  the  correctness  of  the  settlement 
of  transactions.     To  suppose  that  the 
activity  of  production  or  the  expansion 
of  enterprise  can  be  affected  by  a  rais- 
ing or  lowering  of  the  standard — ex- 
cept as  it  is  hampered  by  the  process 
of  the  change — is  equivalent  to     sup- 
posing that  more  or  less  corn  would 
be  produced  by  changing  the  bushel 
measure,  or  more  or  less  cloth  weaved 
if  the  yardstick     was     shortened     or 
lengthened.    A  very  clear  proof  of  this 
is  found  in  the  mercantile  history  of 
the  world  for  the  past  half  century. 
During  the  26  years  after  the  discovery 
of  gold   in   California   and   Australia, 
when  gold  decreased  in  value  by  reason 
of  its  greater  production,  there  was  an 
immense  expansion  of  material  wealth; 
during  the  23  years  when  gold  has  slight- 
ly enhanced  in  value,  an  even  greater 
expansion  of  material  wealth  has  taken 
place,  due  to  the  continuance  of  the 
same  influences  of  invention  and  im- 
provement.   The  means  of    producing 
more  by  the  same  labor,  of  lessening 
the  distance  between  distant  fields  of 


production  and  the  markets  of  con- 
sumption, continue  whether  the  stan- 
dard is  raised  or  lowered.  The  material 
wealth  produced  is  just  the  same 
whether  the  standard  is  raised  or  low- 
ered. The  material  wealth  produced 
is  just  the  same  whether  it  is  meas- 
ured by  francs  in  France,  by  dollars 
worth  five  times  as  much  in  the  United 
States,  or  by  pounds  worth  about  five 
times  more  in  England.  But  the 
wrong  and  injustice  of  vitiating  set- 
tlements by  a  sudden  and  revolution- 
ary change  in  the  standard  may  destroy 
credit  and  for  a  period  visit  immeas- 
urable calamities  on  industry. 

It  follows,  therefore,  that  while  un- 
foreseen and  gradual  changes  in  an 
adopted  standard  must  be  accepted  as 
an  indication  of  human  inability  to  at- 
tain the  perfected  ideal,  the  intentional 
and  deliberate  alteration  of  the  stan- 
dard for  the  purpose  of  changing  the 
measure  of  values  is  a  monstrous  and 
incalculable  wrong.  If  the  change  by 
European  nations  from  silver  to  gold 
in  1871  and  succeeding  years  had  been 
made,  as  charged  by  the  silverites,  for 
the  purpose  of  raising  the  standard  and 
increasing  the  amount  of  debt  to  be 
paid,  the  description  of  it  as  "a  crime" 
would  be  correct.  And  if  that  were 
true,  the  pending  proposition  to  delib- 
erately and  avowedly  lower  the  stan- 
dard for  the  purpose  of  decreasing  the 
amount  of  debt  to  be  paid,  and  taking 
away  the  exact  percentage  of  deprecia- 
tion from  savings  and  wages,  would 
be  a  no  less  wanton  and  unjustifiable 
crime. 

We  have  seen  in  the  examination  of 
the  subject  that  the  charge  of  an  inten- 
tional and  deliberate  raising  of  the 
standard  in  1870  to  1873  is  a  persistent 
and  malicious  slander.  The  United 
States  had  nothing  to  do  with  it;  the 
few  European  governments  that 
changed  from  gold  to  silver  selected 
the  cheaper  and  more  abundant  metal, 
and  provided  what  the  free  silver  party 
of  this  date  refuses  to  do,  that  pay- 
ments contracted  for  in  the  old  stan- 
dard could  be  discharged  by  paying 


88 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


the  real  value  in  which  they  were  con- 
tracted. But  even  supposing  that  there 
was  an  injustice  inflicted  in  1870  to 
1873,  the  fact  that  there  was  a  wrong 
a  quarter  of  a  century  ago  does  not  at 
all  justify  the  infliction  of  another  and 
greater  wrong  to-day. 

It  is  in  the  practical  proposition  that 
two  wrongs  make  a  right  that  the  free 
silver  advocates  show  their  utter  lack 
of  moral  sense  or  upright  judgment.  If 
it  could  be  allowed  that  because  of  what 
was  done  in  1873  to  one  set  of  men, 
it  is  right  to  attack  another  and 
entirely  distinct  set  of  men  a  quar- 
ter of  a  century  later,  the  free  silver 
proposition  contains  its  own  disproof. 
For  accepting  the  view  that  since  1873 
there  has  been  an  appreciation  in  gold, 
if  it  is  to  be  held  that  one  change  is 
to  balance  another,  that  appreciation 
can  be  set  off  against  the  decline  in  its 
purchasing  power  from  1848  to  1870. 
Prices  outside  the  staples  affected  by 
inventions  are  not  yet  as  low  as  they 
were  in  1847,  and  if  the  movement  in 
one  direction  can  be  justified  by  a 
movement  in  the  opposite  direction  25 
years  before,  the  results  of  1873  have 
not  yet  balanced  the  movement  in  the 
opposite  direction  beginning  in  1848. 

Of  course,  the  idea  that  a  disturbance 
of  the  standard  in  one  direction  is  jus- 
tified by  another  in  the  other  direction 
20  or  30  years  earlier  is  a  product  of 
the  wildest  and  most  irresponsible 
sophistry.  The  fact  is  that  no  such 
arrant  unreason  has  ever  controlled 
our  legislation.  The  act  of  1853  found 
the  nation  on  the  gold  basis,  placed 
there  by  the  laws  of  trade,  and  enacted 
legislation  intended  to  keep  it  there. 
The  act  of  1873  did  nothing  with  sil- 
ver but  to  conform  to  the  conditions 
established  in  1853,  and  existing  then 
in  the  only  part  of  the  country  using 
coin  at  all.  The  acts  of  1878  and  1890, 
though  carrying  the  policy  of  increas- 
ing the  use  of  silver  to  a  hazardous 
extent,  kept  the  standard  where  it  was, 
and  the  repeal  of  silver  purchase  in 
1893  was  for  the  express  purpose  of  pre- 
venting the  threatened  change  of  stan- 


dard to  the  silver  basis.  It  is  reserved 
for  the  free  silver  school  alone  in  mod- 
ern times  to  propose  a  radical  and  rev- 
olutionary lowering  of  the  standard, 
with  the  avowed  purpose,  by  some  of 
them,  and  the  real  purpose,  concealed 
only  by  deceptive  phraseology,  by 
others,  of  changing  the  measure  In 
which  debts  must  be  paid. 

Such  a  proposition  to  violate  the  basic 
principle  of  justice  with  regard  to  all 
standards  and  measurements  cannot 
be  entertained  by  the  people  of  the 
United  States,  when  it  is  understood 
that  its  immediate  and  chief  results 
must  be: 

First — The  demonetization  of  our 
$626,000,000  of  gold,  with  only  $549,- 
000,000  of  silver  to  take  its  place,  and 
the  contraction  of  the  purchasing  pow- 
er of  that  silver  and  the  $700,000,000  of 
outstanding  notes  by  nearly  one-half, 
thus  reducing  nearly  $1,900,000,000  of 
our  present  money  to  a  gold  value  of 
between  $600,000,000  and  $700,000,000. 

Second — The  contraction  of  credits, 
the  stoppage  of  mercantile  operations 
and  the  suspension  of  industry  while 
the  change  is  going  on  and  the  read- 
justment is  made,  and  the  indefinite 
stoppage  of  foreign  investments. 

Third— The  scaling  down  of  the  sav- 
ings and  investments  of  the  people,  in- 
cluding savings  banks  depositors,  build- 
ing and  loan  associations,  life  and  fire 
insurance  policy-holders,  United  States 
pensioners  and  all  the  small  investors, 
who,  either  through  corporate  agencies 
or  outside  of  them,  have  saved  their 
earnings  and  lent  them  generally  to 
men  of  larger  means  to  improve  their 
property  or  carry  on  great  industrial 
operations. 

Fourth— The  raising  of  the  prices  of 
foreign  products  first  of  all,  so  that  the 
people  must  pay  more  for  sugar,  tea, 
coffee  and  a  score  of  similar  products 
during  the  years  they  are  waiting  for 
the  price  of  their  own  products  to  re- 
cover from  the  contraction  of  currency 
and  credits,  and  to  rise  in  equal  pro- 
portion. 
Fifth — The  vast  robbery  of  wages  in 


89 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


the  fact  that  even  after  the  suspension 
of  industry  is  over,  the  invariable  rule 
is  that  wages  do  not  rise  in  proportion 
to  commodities,  and  that  every  depreci- 
ation of  the  currency  has  for  years  in- 
flicted a  loss  on  labor  of  from  25  to  33 
per  cent  by  the  decreased  power  of  its 
wages  to  buy  the  necessaries  of  life. 

All  this  injury,  injustice  and  loss  is 
to  be  inflicted  for  the  purpose  of  se- 
curing a  nominal  rise  in  prices,  the 
true  character  of  which  is  shown  in 
the  fact  that  the  commodity  now  sold 
for  a  dollar  will,  if  the  dollar  is  de- 
preciated one-half,  be  sold  for  two  dol- 
lars, because  the  two  dollars  will  be 
worth  just  exactly  as  much  as  the  pre- 
vious dollar  was.  In  addition  this 
purely  fictitious  change  is  urged  on 
the  monstrous  proposition  that  because 
a  smaller  and  wholly  unintentional  in- 
jury, compensated  for  by  the  reduction 
in  interest  rates,  fell  on  debtors  23 
years  ago,  therefore  a  greater  and  in- 
tentional injury  is  to  be  inflicted  on 
the  masses,  comprising  half  the  work- 
ing population,  who  have  invested  their 
savings  in  interest-bearing  securities, 
of  which  investments  over  three-quar- 
ters have  been  made  within  the  past 
10  or  15  years.  When  the  people  of  the 
United  States  understand  the  enormous 
dishonesty  and  stupidity  of  the  propo- 
sition and  the  incalculable  damage  it 
will  inflict  on  the  people,  they  will  re- 
pudiate it  overwhelmingly  and  con- 
clusively. 

In  place  of  this  fantastical  freak  of 
suicidal  and  dishonest  tampering  with 
the  basis  of  trade,  what  is  the  proper 
course?  Many  people  believe  in  adher- 
ing to  the  single  gold  standard;  but  the 
Republican  party  has  declared  the  po- 
sition which  The  Dispatch  has  held  for 
many  years,  and  in  which  it  believes 
that  the  vast  majority  of  the  sober 
sense  of  the  country  agrees,  in  favor 
of  establishing  real  bimetallism  by  the 
only  means  of  securely  maintaining  it, 
through  international  agreement  or 
concurrent  action.  This  does  not  mean 
that  there  shall  be  an  international 
treaty  by  which  one  foreign  nation 


shall  rule  the  coinage  of  another,  as 
the  Democratic  candidate  has  ignorant- 
ly  represented.  It  simply  means  that, 
by  concurrent  agreement,  each  nation 
in  its  own  country  shall  establish  a 
monetary  use  for  silver  which  will  both 
steady  its  fluctuations  and  enlarge  the 
monetary  stock  of  the  world. 

The  reason  for  international  bimet- 
allism is  two-fold.     The  first  is  that 
where  it  has  a  practically  world-wide 
existence  the  fluctuations  of  the  two 
metals  minimize  each  other.    We  have 
seen  that  in  the  period  when  gold  has 
immensely  increased  in  production,  sil- 
ver all  over  the  world  went  to  a  premi- 
um of  4  to  7  per  cent  in  gold,  which 
was  considerably  less  than  the  rise  in 
commodities.    The  free  silver  advocates 
have  attempted  to  make  this  fact  ap- 
pear to  be  a  support  of  their  theory. 
As  usual,  they  are  unable  to  state  the 
fact  correctly,  claiming  that  silver  in 
the  fifties  and  sixties  declined  equally 
with  gold,  and  was  retained  in  use.  The 
fact  is  that  It  did  not  decline  equally 
with  gold,  but  went  to    a    premium, 
which  sent  it  entirely  out  of  use  in  the 
United  States — except    fractional    sil- 
ver, after  it  was  reduced  to  a  ratio 
of  less  than  15  to  l^and  practically 
out  of  use  in  France.     But  the  same 
operation  made  the  rise  in  silver  much 
less  than  the  rise  in  commodities,  and 
proved  that  when  bimetallism  is  inter- 
national in  extent,  and  only  then,  it 
decreases  the  relative  fluctuations  of 
the  two  metals. 

The  other  reason  is  strongly  akin  to 
the  one  already  stated.  It  is  that  the 
larger  the  stock  of  anything  in  the 
world  the  less  effect  will  be  produced 
by  the  increase  or  decrease  of  the  an- 
nual production;  and,  in  the  same  re- 
lation, if  there  are  two  sources  of  sup- 
ply the  increase  of  the  one  may  be  set 
off  by  the  decrease  of  the  other.  To 
ilustrate  the  principle  from  nature,  if 
there  is  a  vast  body  like  our  great  lakes 
or  the  Mediterranean  Sea  the  rise  or 
fall  of  the  streams  flowing  into  it  will 
exercise  the  slightest  and  most  gradual 
effect,  on  the  level  of  the  main  body, 
But  if  any  set  of  men  should  declare 


90 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


themselves  dissatisfied  with  the  level 
of  the  greater  body,  and  should  set  up 
a  smaller  lake  of  their  own  fed  by  but 
one  stream,  its  level  would  be  very  ma- 
terially affected  by  the  rise  and  fall  of 
that  single  stream.  The  same  is  true 
of  gold  and  silver.  The  total  volume 
of  the  world's  money  will  be  nearly 
twice  as  great  and  fluctuations  in  pur- 
chasing power  much  less  if  both  metals 
can  be  united  in  one  great  body.  But 
it  is  absolutely  necessary  to  secure  that 
result  that  they  be  united  in  a  single 
vast  monetary  total.  The  benefit  can- 
not be  attained  if  one  nation  sets  up  a 
little  pool  of  its  own,  to  rise  and  fall 
with  the  fluctuations  of  the  metal  it 
adopts. 

To  observe  the  basic  principle  of  not 
falsifying  the  existing  standard,  any  in- 
ternational arragnement  should  con- 
form itself  to  the  standard  as  it  now 
exists.  As  The  Dispatch  has  shown 
heretofore,  the  most  complete  solution 
of  the  question  is  in  making  the  stan- 
dard the  joint  value  of  the  two  metals 
instead  of  the  value  of  the  cheaper 
metal.  Such  a  plan  would  permit  the 
circulating  notes  to  be  redeemed  and 
debts  to  be  paid  in  equal  values  of  gold 
and  silver.  This  would  make  the  var- 
iations of  the  standard  and  the  mean  of 
the  fluctuations  of  both  metals  instead 
or  the  fluctuations  of  the  cheaper  metal 
under  the  old  bimetallism  or  the  fluctu- 
ations of  the  single  metal  under  either 
monometallism. 

These  are  reasons  why  the  great 
mass  of  the  people  of  the  United  States 
believe  in  real  bimetallism  as  better 
than  either  gold  monometallism  or  sil- 
ver monometallism.  How  and  when 
that  gain  can  be  obtained  is  a  ques- 
tion for  the  future.  The  question  now 
before  the  people  is  whether  it  shall 
retain  its  present  standard  or  sink  to 
the  inferior  and  inconvenient  silver 
standard  with  all  the  hazards  of  the 
change. 

Some  of  our  free  silver  critics  have 
expressed  a  desire  that  The  Dispatch 
shall  say  how  much  money  per  capita 
the  Nation  shall  have,  and  where  it 


is  to  get  it  under  the  gold  standard. 
We  have  answered  that  to  fix  an 
amount  of  money  per  capita  would  be 
as  stupid  as  to  fix  the  amount  of  bread 
per  capita.  At  one  time  money  is 
abundant;  at  another  it  is  scarce.  That 
there  should  be  elasticity  in  the  paper 
circulation,  elasticity  that  will  contract 
when  it  is  superabundant  as  well  as 
expand  when  it  is  insufficient,  is  true. 
It  is  just  as  important  that  idle  funds 
shall  not  accumulate  to  encourage 
specuation  and  bubble  blowing  as  that 
when  legitimate  trade  needs  more  cur- 
rent funds  they  shall  be  forthcoming. 
The  means  that  can  be  provided  for 
elasticity  in  the  circulating  medium 
are  important  topics,  but  that  they 
have  no  bearing  on  the  question  now 
in  issue  is  apparent  in  the  fact  that 
whether  we  adopt  gold  or  silver,  under 
free  coinage,  the  amount  of  either  will 
be  fixed  by  the  same  influences  of  de- 
mand and  supply. 

If  we  maintain  the  gold  basis  the 
amount  of  that  metal  that  comes  into 
our  coinage  will  be  governed  by  the 
trade  demand,  just  as  it  has  been  for 
the  past  20  years.  If  we  adopt  the  sil- 
ver basis  by  free  coinage  the  amount 
sent  to  the  mints  for  coinage  will  be 
determined  by  exactly  the  same  force. 
So  far  as  the  question  to  be  decided 
by  the  United  States  in  this  campaign 
is  concerned,  therefore,  the  amount  of 
coined  money  that  we  are  to  have  can 
be  determined  only  by  the  natural  de- 
mand and  supply  in  this  and  other 
countries,  just  as  its  value  is. 

The  question  for  the  people  to  de- 
termine is  whether  they  will  retain  the 
standard  under  which  for  20  years  prior 
to  1893  the  country  prospered,  wages 
advanced,  and  industry  and  wealth 
multiplied,  or  whether  they  will  make 
a  change  in  the  standard  to  gratify  the 
irresponsible  desire  for  overturning  and 
upsetting  existing  adjustments,  of 
which  we  have  felt  the  dire  effects  for 
the  past  three  years.  The  standard 
bearer  of  the  free  silver  cause  was  one 
of  the  leaders  in  demanding  the  dis- 
turbance of  industry  by  changing  the 


91 


A  SILVER  SYMPOSIUM. 


tariff  arrangement  and  in  picturing  the 
benefits  which  would  accrue  to  the  peo- 
ple, and  which  have  materialized  in  the 
actualities  of  disaster  and  prostration. 
He  now  appears  as  the  champion  of  an- 
other change,  more  universal  and  far- 
reaching  in  its  effects,  more  dishonest 
in  its  arguments,  and  of  the  true  re- 
sults of  which  he  has  already  shown 
himself  to  be  more  utterly  ignorant 
than  he  was  concerning  the  tariff. 

The  most  impressive  measure  of  this 
ignorance  is  to  be  found  in  the  belief 
that  the  public  will  be  benefited  by 
the  rise  of  prices  due  to  enacting  that 
the  present  value  of  half  a  dollar  shall 
be  a  dollar,  and  the  delusion  that  the' 
masses  are  to  be  benefited  by  scaling 
down  the  investments  in  which  their 
savings  can  be  put.  •  There  never  was  a 
more  stupendous  example  of  ignorant 
quackery  than  this.  The  way  to  benefit 
the  masses  is  to  encourage  them  to  save 
their  earnings,  by  making  the  invest- 
ments in  which  those  earnings  can  be 
placed  secure  and  stable.  It  has  been 
a  crying  evil  of  the  day  that  the  in- 
vestment of  savings  in  corporate  shares 
has  been  so  juggled  with  as  to  make  it 
one  of  the  means  of  concentrating  into 


the  hands  of  the  great  millionaires  the 
wealth  that  ought  to  be  diffused.  But 
it  is  a  travesty  and  aggravation,  that 
after  this  wrong  has  been  inflicted  and 
the  great  manipulators  are  the  repre- 
sentative owners  of  corporate  shares, 
the  savings  of  the  masses  are  again  to 
be  attacked  by  a  measure  which,  wheth- 
er they  are  invested  in  building  and 
loan  mortgages  or  railway  bonds,  will 
scale  them  down  nearly  one-half,  and  in 
the  largest  instance  will  make  a  pres- 
ent of  the  loss  of  the  small  investors  to 
the  great  corporate  manipulators. 

Prosperity,  national  growth  and  the 
welfare  of  the  people  are  not  to  be  se- 
cured by  such  means.  Industry  and 
commerce  are  ready  to  move  forward  if 
confidence  is  restored.  The  mainten- 
ance of  credit,  the  upholding  of  the 
standard  of  strict  integrity  and  the  re- 
tention of  the  means  which  made  the 
country  prosperous  and  great,  until  the 
Democratic  determination  to  overthrow 
things  had  its  effect,  are  the  need  of  the 
day.  The  standard  by  which  the  sav- 
ings of  the  people  and  the  wages  of 
labor  are  to  be  paid  cannot  be  tampered 
with  and  falsified  without  the  greatest 
injury  to  the  whole  body  politic. 


